Lawyer Nikolai Polozov has said that Ukrainian pilot Nadia Savchenko is deprived of sleep at Moscow's Serbsky Institute where she was taken for a psychiatric examination.
“I have met with Nadia Savchenko at the Serbsky Institute. I must say that the conditions for meetings with defense lawyers are terrible and contradict the European Convention [on Human Rights]. A confidential communication with defense lawyers is not ensured. I spoke to her through the glass in the presence of five FSIN employees, including a colonel,” he wrote on his page on Twitter on Friday, Oct. 17.
“Nadia is deprived of sleep at the Serbsky Institute. A FSIN employee sits in the doorway all night long and watches her. We regard it as torture,” he added.
The lawyer also noted that an investigator had demanded that the pilot’s mother persuade her “to refuse the services of the current lawyers and take loyal ones.”
Polozov also said that Savchenko was banned from not only writing letters, but also preparing papers for court meetings.
It was reported earlier that Savchenko, who is charged with being involved in the killing of Russian journalists in Ukraine, was moved to Moscow to undergo a psychiatric examination.
Savchenko’s custody term has been extended until Oct. 30.
On Oct. 13, the Basmanny District Court of Moscow will continue hearing the appeal from Savchenko’s defense lawyers against the court order for psychiatric examination. By law, no investigative procedures can be carried out before the court rules on the appeal.
According to Russian investigators, the 31-year-old navigator was fighting with the Aidar volunteer battalion in eastern Ukraine when she was captured by illegal armed units in June near the town of Schastia, a suburb of Luhansk. It was said on July 8 that she was being held at the Voronezh pre-trial detention facility in Russia.
The Russian Investigative Committee claimed that Savchenko had crossed the border without documents under the guise of a refugee and was detained later for identification, after which it turned out that she was suspected of playing some role in the killing of Russian TV journalists Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin near Luhansk. On July 9, Russia indicted her for complicity in murder.
For its part, Ukraine has insisted that all Ukrainian captives held in custody in Russia, including Savchenko, should be released under the Minsk protocol clause requiring the release of all hostages.
Savchenko tops the party ticket of the Ukrainian Batkivschyna Party led by ex-prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko in the early parliamentary elections in Ukraine due on Oct. 26.
