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Pardoned ex-pilot Savchenko goes on another hunger strike

Savchenko says she is going on a hunger strike until positive results are achieved concerning the situation in the Donbass region

Verkhovna Rada member from the Fatherland party Nadezhda Savchenko EPA/TOMASZ

Verkhovna Rada member from the Fatherland party Nadezhda Savchenko

KIEV, August 2. /TASS/. Former Ukrainian pilot and currently a Verkhovna Rada member from the Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) political party Nadezhda Savchenko has started another hunger strike.

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Speaking about the situation in the Donbass region at a news conference in Kiev on Tuesday, Savchenko reiterated that "it’s necessary to stop the hostilities and put an end to all this mess."

"I have already said that I consider the release of prisoners to be a priority issue," Savchenko went on to say. "That’s why I am going on a hunger strike as of today … until positive results are achieved."

She also accused the Ukrainian authorities of inactivity in addressing the issue.

A Russian court found Nadezhda Savchenko, a former servicewoman of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, guilty of involvement in the killing of Russian TV reporters Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin and of illegally crossing the Russian border. During the court hearings Savchenko went on hunger strikes several times.

On March 22, the court in Donetsk, a town in Russia’s southern Rostov region, sentenced her to 22 years in a general penal colony.

At the request of Kornelyuk and Voloshin’s relatives, Russian President Vladimir Putin pardoned Savchenko on May 25. A jet took her to Kiev shortly after.

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