Jailed Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich has been charged with espionage in Russia and formally denied his guilt, according to two Russian state news agencies.

Interfax and TASS reported, citing an unnamed law enforcement source, that Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) had officially charged the American journalist, but they did not say how or when it happened.

“The FSB investigation charged Gershkovich with espionage in the interests of his country,” TASS quoted the source as saying. “He categorically denied all accusations and stated that he was engaged in journalistic activities in Russia.”

No further details were released about the proceedings in the spying case, which is deemed secret.

In the Russian legal system, the filing of charges and a response from the defendant represent the formal start of a criminal probe, setting in motion what could be a long and opaque Russian judicial process.

Gershkovich, 31, a veteran reporter covering politics and the war in Ukraine, was arrested in Yekaterinburg on March 29 on suspicion of espionage, accused of trying to obtain classified information about a military factory.

A judge last week ordered Gershkovich held in Moscow’s notorious Lefortovo jail for the next two months.

He is the first foreign reporter to face spying claims in Russian since the Cold War.

The son of Soviet immigrants who was raised in New Jersey, Gershkovich has covered Russia for the past six years for various well-respected publications, most recently The Journal, which hired him in Jan. 2022.

The Journal has denied the accusations against Gershkovich and demanded the immediate release of its “trusted and dedicated reporter.”

The publication said his arrest was “a vicious affront to a free press, and should spur outrage in all free people and governments throughout the world.”

In a rare moment of bipartisanship, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell on Thursday released a joint statement, calling on Russia to immediately release Gershkovich, whom they touted as an “internationally known and respected independent journalist.”

Their words echoed President Biden’s remarks on Gershkovich a week ago, when he demanded that Russia “let him go.”

Also on Thursday, US Ambassador to Russia Lynne Tracy held a meeting with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, who stressed “the serious nature of the charges” against Gershkovich, according to a Russian Foreign Ministry statement.

The statement regurgitated earlier Russian claims that the US correspondent “was caught red-handed while trying to obtain secret information, using his journalistic status as a cover for illegal actions.”

Lawyers representing Gershkovich met with him Tuesday for the first time since his detention, according to Wall Street Journal Editor-in-Chief Emma Tucker.

Tucker said the reporter is in good health and “is grateful for the outpouring of support from around the world. We continue to call for his immediate release.”

With Post wires