US basketball star Brittney Griner has had her pre-trial detention in Russia extended by one month, with her lawyer saying it indicates she will go to trial soon.
The 31-year-old American WNBA star has been in custody for nearly three months.
Griner, a two-time Olympic gold medallist who plays for the Phoenix Mercury, was detained at a Moscow airport in February after vape cartridges containing oil derived from cannabis were allegedly found in her luggage.
She faces drug smuggling charges that carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison.
Griner appeared for a brief hearing at a court outside Moscow on Friday handcuffed, wearing an orange hoodie and holding her face down.
She did not express "any complaints about the detention conditions", her lawyer Alexander Boykov said.
US President Joe Biden's administration says Griner is being wrongfully detained. The WNBA and US officials have worked toward her release, without visible progress.
Hours after the extension, the Mercury star's agent, Lindsay Kagawa Colas, tweeted that Griner's team expected the government "to use all options available to immediately and safely bring Griner home".
State Department spokesman Ned Price said diplomats from the US embassy in Moscow spoke with Griner on Friday and reported she was "doing as well as can be expected in these circumstances".
Russian officials have described Griner's case as a criminal offence, and have not suggested there are any political associations. But Moscow's war in Ukraine has brought US-Russia relations to the lowest level since the Cold War.
Despite the strain, Russia and the United States carried out an unexpected prisoner exchange last month, trading former marine Trevor Reed for Konstantin Yaroshenko, a Russian pilot serving a 20-year federal prison sentence for conspiring to smuggle cocaine into the United States.
While the US does not typically embrace such exchanges, it made the deal in part because the pilot had already served a large part of his sentence.
The Russians may consider Griner someone who could figure into another such exchange.
The US State Department last week said it now regarded Griner to be wrongfully detained, a change in classification that suggests the US government will be more active in trying to secure her release even while the legal case plays out.
The status change places her case under the purview of the department's special presidential envoy for hostage affairs, which is responsible for negotiating for the release of hostages and Americans considered wrongfully detained.
Also working on the case now is a centre led by Bill Richardson, the former US ambassador to the United Nations who helped secure the release of multiple hostages and detainees, including Reed.
It is not entirely clear why the US government, which for weeks had been more circumspect in its approach, reclassified Griner as a wrongful detainee. But under federal law, there are a number of factors that go into such a characterisation, including if the detention is based on being an American or if the detainee has been denied due process
Besides Griner, another American regarded as unjustly detained in Russia is Paul Whelan, a corporate security executive from Michigan. Mr Whelan was arrested in December 2018 while visiting for a friend's wedding and was later sentenced to 16 years in prison on espionage-related charges his family has said are bogus.
ABC/wires
