Nadiya Savchenko

Nadiya Savchenko
Надія Савченко
Savchenko in Warsaw, Poland, May 2017
People's Deputy of Ukraine
8th convocation
In office
27 November 2014 – 24 July 2019
ConstituencyBatkivshchyna, No.1[1][2]
Personal details
Born
Nadiya Viktorivna Savchenko

(1981-05-11) 11 May 1981 (age 43)
Kyiv, Ukrainian SSR, Soviet Union
(now Ukraine)
Political partySocial and Political Platform of Nadiya Savchenko (since 2017)[3]
Other political
affiliations		Batkivshchyna (2014–2016)[4][2]
Awards Hero of Ukraine[5][6]
Order For Courage
Military service
AllegianceUkraine Ukraine
Branch/service Ukrainian Armed Forces
Years of service1997–2014
RankFirst lieutenant
Unit3rd Army Aviation Regiment, Brody, Lviv oblast
(2010–2014)

Nadiya Viktorivna Savchenko (Ukrainian: Надія Вікторівна Савченко; born 11 May 1981) is a Ukrainian politician, former Army aviation pilot in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and former People's Deputy of Ukraine.[7]

During the 2014 War in Donbas, Savchenko was a first lieutenant in the Ukrainian Ground Forces and served as instructor with a volunteer infantry unit, the Aidar Battalion. In June 2014, she was captured by pro-Russian forces in eastern Ukraine[8] and handed over to Russia where she was accused of having directed artillery fire that killed two Russian state-television journalists at the positions of pro-Russian forces in Ukraine.[9]

She was subsequently charged and convicted of murder and illegally crossing the Russian state border,[10][11][12] despite being abducted from Ukrainian territory one hour before the deaths of the journalists.[13][14] One of her lawyers, Mark Feygin, said she was a prisoner-of-war and called on the International Committee of the Red Cross and the United Nations to demand her immediate release and that of the other Ukrainian POWs lest Russia be held in violation of the Geneva Conventions.[15][9] European Union ministers and their representative regarded her detention as illegal and that her trial did not respect basic human rights, including the right to fair proceedings.[16]

In November 2014, while still imprisoned, Savchenko was elected to the Verkhovna Rada in the 2014 Ukrainian parliamentary election, and she formally resigned from her military post.[17][10][18] On 25 May 2016, Savchencko was exchanged in a prisoner swap for Russian GRU officers[19] Yevgeny Yerofeyev and Alexander Alexandrov captured by Ukraine.[20]

After returning to Ukraine, Savchenko declared her intention to participate as a presidential candidate in the 2019 Ukrainian presidential election.[21] However, she was arrested on 22 March 2018, charged with planning a terrorist attack to overthrow the Ukrainian government.[22][23] She was released from detention on 15 April 2019.[24]

Savchenko was one of Ukraine's first women to train as a military airplane pilot, and is the only female aviator to pilot the Sukhoi Su-24 bomber and the Mil Mi-24 helicopter.[25]

  1. ^ "People's Deputy of Ukraine of the VIII convocation". Official portal (in Ukrainian). Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. Retrieved 22 December 2014.
  2. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference NSmBCEC was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ Cite error: The named reference Nadiya Savchenko 25 July 2017 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference NSlB131216 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Cite error: The named reference heroia was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference NYT201605 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ Cite error: The named reference RFEpJ16 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  8. ^ Cite error: The named reference rainOR was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  9. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference NewYorker-20160410 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  10. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference TASS-20141107 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  11. ^ Cite error: The named reference BBC140709 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  12. ^ Cite error: The named reference NBC140709 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  13. ^ According to version by the prosecution, the rebels who captured Savchenko let her go and she crossed Russian border, "I have right for everything", by Novaya gazeta
  14. ^ Azar, Iliya (21 March 2016). "Я ее взял и лично передал Плотницкому" (in Russian). Meduza.io. Retrieved 22 March 2016.
  15. ^ Cite error: The named reference WP141224 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  16. ^ Cite error: The named reference EEAS-2016 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  17. ^ Cite error: The named reference NSinRda714 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  18. ^ Cite error: The named reference NSsp221214 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  19. ^ Ерофеев и Александров: на кого обменяли Савченко [Erofeev and Alexandrov: who was exchanged for Savchenko] (in Russian). Bbc.com. 25 May 2016. Retrieved 25 July 2017.
  20. ^ Cite error: The named reference BBC201605 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  21. ^ "Савченко заявила, что будет участвовать в президентских выборах на Украине в 2019 году". Народные Новости. Archived from the original on 9 February 2022. Retrieved 6 August 2018.
  22. ^ (in Ukrainian) Savchenko complains that the SBU prevents her from going to the presidency, Ukrayinska Pravda (15 January 2019)
  23. ^ They planned to finish everyone off. The case of Nadezhda Savchenko almost reached the court (Russian), by RFE/RL
  24. ^ Cite error: The named reference sacdrrfd was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  25. ^ Cite error: The named reference Grani-NS was invoked but never defined (see the help page).