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Preliminary hearings in Savchenko case begin in Russia’s Rostov region

Nadezhda Savchenko has been in custody in Russia since July 2014 on charges of complicity in the murder of two Russian journalists in Ukraine's Luhansk region last June

Nadezhda Savchenko Vyacheslav Prokofyev/TASS

Nadezhda Savchenko

© Vyacheslav Prokofyev/TASS

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ROSTOV-ON-DON, July 30. /TASS/. Preliminary hearings in the case of former Ukrainian service member Nadezhda Savchenko begin on Thursday in the Donetsk city court in Russia’s southern Rostov region. Savchenko’s defense is preparing a number of petitions.

Nadezhda Savchenko has been in custody in Russia since July 2014 on charges of complicity in the murder of two Russian journalists — Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin — in Ukraine's Luhansk region last June. The defendant’s lawyers believe the trial will not last more than a month.

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"There will be a number of petitions. In spite of refusals, we will try to change the court jurisdiction," one of the Savchenko’s lawyers, Mark Feigin, said. "We need to deal with some very important issues, such as, visits to Savchenko. At the moment a court ruling is required for a visit. And the most important thing is the date of the first open court hearing. We have our own considerations on this matter, which we do not want to disclose so far."

He noted, that, in addition to him, the preliminary hearings would be attended by the second lawyer Nikolay Polozov. The third lawyer Ilya Novikov is to join the trial later, as he is in Ukraine now. "We are overseeing the case of such scope at a court of original jurisdiction for the first time. We have no idea how competent the judges overseeing this case are," Feigin said.

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Nadezhda Savchenko

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