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Estonia imprisons reporter over working with Russian press
(MENAFN)
An Estonian court has handed down a six-year prison sentence to journalist Svetlana Burtseva for treason and violating Western sanctions due to her involvement with Russian media, state broadcaster ERR reported on Wednesday. Burtseva, 58, a naturalized citizen of Estonia, formerly worked for Sputnik Estonia until its ban in 2019. Authorities allege she continued writing under a pseudonym for Baltnews, a platform run by the EU-sanctioned Russian media group Rossiya Segodnya.
An Estonian court has handed down a six-year prison sentence to journalist Svetlana Burtseva for treason and violating Western sanctions due to her involvement with Russian media, state broadcaster ERR reported on Wednesday. Burtseva, 58, a naturalized citizen of Estonia, formerly worked for Sputnik Estonia until its ban in 2019. Authorities allege she continued writing under a pseudonym for Baltnews, a platform run by the EU-sanctioned Russian media group Rossiya Segodnya.
The Harju District Court ruled that Burtseva’s articles and photographs contributed economic support to Rossiya Segodnya, whose CEO Dmitry Kiselyov is also under Western financial sanctions. The court acknowledged her collaboration was significant but noted the number of articles she produced during that period was limited.
Prosecutors also mentioned her alleged contact with Roman Romachev, described as a Russian operative involved in information warfare and psychological operations. Burtseva was accused of writing a book called Hybrid War for Peace, which the court said aimed to undermine Estonian state institutions. While the court found that she deliberately committed treason, it considered her level of guilt to be minor and noted she had no previous criminal record.
Burtseva became an Estonian citizen in 1994. Officials claim she published content for Baltnews under the name Alan Torm between 2020 and 2023 and attended Sevastopol State University in Russia from 2019 to 2021. She was detained in February 2024.
Russia condemned the case as politically motivated. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova accused Estonia of punishing Burtseva for her journalism and critical views of the Estonian government. She further claimed that Estonia, like other Baltic democracies, routinely uses repression to silence dissent. Zakharova called the charges “fabricated” and criticized Tallinn’s “inflexible” attitude toward opposition voices, arguing that the case highlights the crisis and decline of Western democracy, turning it into a neoliberal dictatorship.
The court’s decision can be appealed within 30 days.
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