Russia is not doing a very good job lately in hiding its connections with separatists in the Donbas. Nadiya Savchenko, female officer of Ukrainian army's Aydar unit who was captured in Luhansk Oblast on June 17, was transferred to prison in Voronezh, a Russian city not far from the border with Ukraine, reported television news program TSN.
Savchenko is being suspected in the murder of Russian journalists while participating in Ukraine’s antiterrorist operation, though local prosecutors have not come up with an official accusation yet, the senior lieutenant’s Russian lawyer said. However, her younger sister Vira said that the Voronezh court is going to have a first hearing within this case on July 9.
“I was aiming (a gun) at woods where shooting against us was coming from. I have no idea whether I hit anybody or not,” Savchenko said in a June 19 interview with Moscow-based Komsomolskaya Pravda newspaper. She also called Russian journalists liars who made up a story of her allegedly pointing the sniper gun at media workers.
The Kyiv Post tried to reach Voronezh Oblast prosecutor by phone, but no one answered.
The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry in its July 8 official note claims bringing Savchenko to court in Russia to be illegal and demands to allow Ukrainian consul to visit captivated officer in prison. “Openly kidnapping Ukrainian citizens on the territory of our state, Russian authorities not only violate all possible norms of international law, but also basic norms of ethics and morality. Such actions will not be left without an adequate respond from Ukraine and international community,” reads the note.
Veteran of a peacekeeping mission in Iraq whose specialization includes navigating Mi-2 and Su-24 military aircraft, Savchenko went through an interrogation that was videotaped and spread over the Internet by Russian journalists.
Behaving very bravely while being questioned about Ukrainian army’s positions in the east, Savchenko straight-forwardly said that by no reasons she would disclose such information to the enemy. “I gave an oath to the Ukrainian people,” she told a separatist who was surprised to see all the excellent grades for courses of military preparation in her personal file.
“Shoot her. She’s not a woman anymore,” wrote a reader of Komsomolskaya Pravda in the online comments section of the story devoted to Savchenko. “Judging by the way she answers and by her photo, she is a respect-deserving enemy,” replied another one.
Savchenko, whose female sex for a long time would not allow her to enter Kharkiv Air Force University and still keeps from piloting military aircraft, was priced to four captivated separatists by the Kremlin-backed insurgents. But Ukrainian Defense Ministry did not manage to conduct a prisoner exchange – the negotiations ended up with nothing.
In comparison, U.S. exchanged sergeant Bowe Bergdahl for five Taliban members in May after he was held captive in Afghanistan for five years. American army authorities did so despite the fact that Bergdahl before captivation simply walked away of his unit, being disillusioned with the war effort, according to Pentagon investigation.
Thus, no price is too high for Savchenko.
Kyiv Post associate business editor Ivan Verstyuk can be reached at [email protected].
