Russia’s main security agency said on Tuesday that it had arrested a dual citizen of Russia and the US on accusations of committing state treason by raising funds for Ukraine.

The Federal Security Service, known as the FSB, identified the detainee as a 33-year-old woman who lives in Los Angeles. It said in a statement that she had raised money for a Ukrainian organisation that bought weapons and other equipment for Ukraine’s military.

Perviy Otdel, a group of Russian lawyers who specialise in cases involving accusations of treason and other politically charged allegations, said that the woman had been accused of treason for sending just over $50 to Razom for Ukraine, a New York-based non-profit organisation that sends assistance to the country.

The FSB said she had been arrested in the city of Yekaterinburg in central Russia. RIA Novosti, a Russian state news agency, published a video that it said showed the woman, wearing a white hat that covered her eyes, being handcuffed and escorted by masked security service officers.

If convicted, she could face up to 20 years in prison.

The detention of American citizens on Russian soil in recent years has raised suspicions that the Kremlin views them as valuable assets to be traded for high-profile Russians held in custody in the US and other Western countries.

On the same day that the woman’s arrest was announced, a Moscow court rejected an appeal by Evan Gershkovich, an American reporter for The Wall Street Journal whom Russia arrested last spring on an espionage charge, to lift his pretrial detention. It ruled that Gershkovich — who, along with his employer and the US government, has denied the charge against him — must stay in prison at least until the end of March.

A spokesperson, Matthew Miller, said the US had requested consular assistance for the woman, but “that has not yet been granted”.

New York Times News Service