Japan says officials met detained reporter in Russia

Japanese officials have met a journalist detained in Russia for the first time since his arrest on spying accusations earlier this month, Tokyo has said.

Officials from Japan’s embassy in Russia “conducted a consular meeting” with the reporter and “confirmed that the individual has no health issues”, Japan’s foreign ministry said in a statement late Monday.

Russian authorities had earlier said journalist Yuki Imai had been arrested on Sakhalin, an island in Russia’s Far East, on suspicion of conducting espionage activities.

“The Government of Japan strongly urges the Government of the Russian Federation to release the Japanese national immediately and to extend humanitarian consideration as well as fair and impartial treatment,” the foreign ministry statement said.

Moscow has also accused Japan of the widespread use of journalists for espionage, an allegation denied by Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi.

Imai’s employer, Hokkaido Shimbun newspaper, has also stressed its independence from the Japanese government.

The two countries have a decades-old dispute over the status of a string of islands in the Pacific Ocean, off the northeast coast of Japan and to the southwest of Sakhalin.

Japan has also imposed sanctions on Russia after its invasion of Ukraine.

Russia has detained several citizens of what it calls “unfriendly” countries in recent years, accusing them of working for Western intelligence services.