Russian court sentences Ukranian pilot to 22 years in jail
A court in Russia has sentenced a Ukrainian helicopter pilot to 22 years in prison for complicity in the death of two Russian journalists in eastern Ukraine two years ago.
On Tuesday, the Russian court found Ukrainian military pilot Nadiya Savchenko guilty of involvement in the fatal 2014 shelling of an area in eastern that killed two Russian journalists and several civilians.
The 34-year-old pilot, who was fighting in a Kiev government military group against pro-Russia forces at the time, denied the charges, saying she had been kidnapped and smuggled to Russia before journalists Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin were killed in June 2014.
She was captured in July that year for illegally crossing the Russian border and acting as a spotter and calling in coordinates for the mortar attack.
In response to the court ruling, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said his country would never recognize the verdict and called on Russian President Vladimir Putin to send Savchenko back to Ukraine.
He offered to swap Savchenko, who has repeatedly gone on hunger strike, for two Russian soldiers who are detained and on trial for their alleged involvement in the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
Russian officials have previously signaled they would be willing to consider a prisoner exchange, but a Kremlin spokesman was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying on Tuesday that any possible prisoner swap can only be decided by Putin.
Savchenko's lawyer also noted that his defendant had no plan to appeal the "illegal verdict".
Moscow-Kiev ties have been in tatters since the Crimean Peninsula rejoined Russia in a referendum in March 2014 and Kiev commenced a military crackdown on pro-Russian forces fighting for greater autonomy in the Russian-speaking Luhansk and Donetsk in the east of the country.
According to the United Nations, over 9,000 people have lost their lives and some 20,000 have been injured in the conflict since April 2014.
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