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Russian human rights ombudsman visits striking Ukrainian pilot Savchenko in Moscow prison

Russia’s Human Rights Ombudsman Ella Pamfilova described Nadezhda Savchenko's condition as relatively satisfactory

Nadezhda Savchenko Artyom Korotayev/TASS

Nadezhda Savchenko

© Artyom Korotayev/TASS

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MOSCOW, January 30 /TASS/. Russia’s Human Rights Ombudsman Ella Pamfilova has visited Ukrainian pilot Nadezhda Savchenko in a Moscow pre-trial detention facility.

"I have visited Savchenko today. Given the fact that she has been on hunger strike for some time, I can describe her condition as relatively satisfactory," Pamfilova told TASS on Friday.

Savchenko is being accused of complicity to murdering two Russian journalists during the military hostilities in Luhansk in June last year. She was detained and taken into custody near Voronezh in Russian territory. She was then escorted to Moscow to undergo psychiatric examination. Savchenko has been on hunger strike since mid-December.

The Russian human rights ombudsman tried to persuade Savchenko to go off hunger strike. "I certainly asked her to end the hunger strike but she refused," the ombudsman said adding it was good that Savchenko would be under supervision of qualified doctors.

"I will personally follow this case," Pamfilova said.

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According to investigators, Savchenko, a member of Ukraine’s Aidar volunteer battalion, used to be a Mi-24 helicopter gunner. During the military hostilities in Luhansk in June last year, she handed over information about the location of two Russian journalists and other civilians near Luhansk to Ukrainian mortar gunners who later opened fire at those locations. As a result, the employees of the All-Russian State Radio and Television Company (VGTRK) — journalist Igor Kornelyuk and cameraman Anton Voloshin — were killed.

Nadezhda Savchenko applied for permission to discharge from the army after she had been elected deputy of Ukrainian parliament during the October 26 parliamentary elections in Ukraine.

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