The US Justice Department recommended on Wednesday the detention of alleged Russian agent Maria Butina, saying she poses a serious flight risk. The Justice Department said Butina has been in contact with Russian intelligence operatives, kept contact information for several Russian agents and had a handwritten note in her Washington apartment asking how to respond to an offer of employment with a Russian intelligence agency. The department asked a federal court to detain her pending her trial, adding that she has ties with Russian intelligence and will likely appeal to people in the Russian government to help her flee. The 29-year-old former American University graduate student has been accused of working with a high-powered Russian official and two unnamed American citizens, trying to infiltrate a pro-gun rights organization in the United States and influence the United States’ foreign policy toward Russia. Her attorney, Robert Driscoll, has said she is not a Russian agent and poses no flight risk, after she was arrested on Sunday without warning. Her arrest was announced Monday shortly after US President Donald Trump held a summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, where Trump pledged to improve bilateral relations and dismissed US intelligence allegations that Moscow interfered in the 2016 election on Trumps behalf. She was charged with conspiracy and acting illegally as an agent for the Russian government without registering. On Wednesday Moscow said her arrest aimed to undermine the gains made in the summit. "This happened with the obvious task of minimizing the positive effect," of the Trump-Putin meeting, said foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova. The indictment and an accompanying FBI affidavit describe an alleged secret plan for Butina, masquerading as a visiting student, "to conduct activities as an illegal agent of the Russian Federation in the United States through a Russian influence operation." She worked directly for close Putin ally Alexander Torshin, formerly a senior member of the upper house of Russians parliament, and now deputy governor of the Russian central bank. But in a court filing Wednesday, the FBI said she "was in contact with officials believed to be Russian intelligence operatives," including the FSB, Moscows federal security service. Court documents and other records suggest she and Torshin developed plans to "infiltrate" US political society as early as 2011, when Torshin met then-National Rifle Association president David Keene and Butina launched a mirror Russian gun rights group, "The Right to Bear Arms." Russia’s Foreign Ministry on Wednesday said there were no grounds for her arrest, and that its embassy in Washington has requested a meeting with Butina. In 2013 she befriended a well-known Republican operative, not identified in the indictment but widely reported to be Paul Erickson. The two began a romantic relationship and he opened a wide door for her in Washington. She became a "life member" of the NRA and, with its sponsorship, attended numerous conservative and gun rights conferences. She addressed a camp for young Republicans in South Dakota, and stopped by at local US gun stores and shooting ranges. In July 2015, Butina was selected to ask Trump a question about his plans for ties with Russia at a rally in Las Vegas. "I believe I would get along very nicely with Putin.... I dont think youd need the sanctions," he said, in possibly his first campaign trail pronouncement on the issue. Her activities ramped up after she moved to the US capital on a student visa in 2016, when she lived with Erickson. She helped arrange a visit by Torshin and other Russian officials, as they sought to construct a "back channel" network of sympathetic Americans with political influence. The aim, her messages with Torshin expressed, was to turn around strained US-Russia relations. But by 2015 -- well before Moscows meddling in the 2016 election was exposed -- FBI counterintelligence agents saw her as an espionage threat. The indictment said Butinas and Torshins aim was nefarious: "to penetrate the US national decision-making apparatus to advance the agenda of the Russian Federation."