Russia Begins Controversial Psychiatric Evaluation of Captured Ukrainian Pilot [View all]

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Source: Vice News

Russian authorities have begun a psychiatric evaluation of captured Ukrainian air force pilot Nadiya Savchenko, who is accused of complicity in the killing of Russian journalists in eastern Ukraine, without waiting for a court hearing on this procedure. Human rights observers have called the case against Savchenko politically motivated, and US authorities have said that her freedom is one of the conditions for sanctions against Russia to be relaxed.

Russia's Investigative Committee announced Monday that Savchenko had been moved from a pre-trial detention center to a Moscow psychiatric institute for an evaluation of her sanity, the same day that a court in the capital was to consider her complaint about the procedure. In a closed session, the court later delayed the hearing until November 11 due to Savchenko's absence. Police detained a protestor carrying a sign that read "Nadiya Savchenko is Joan of Arc," and yelling "Glory to Ukraine" outside the court.

"Only after the evaluation will we have a chance to appeal the evaluation. We think this is wrong," Savchenko's lawyer Mark Feygin, who previously defended the activist punk group Pussy Riot, told reporters after the decision to delay the hearing. "Investigators said the [psychiatric] evaluation should be conducted without interruption. This is a violation of the law, and it's being done to keep Savchenko out of court and limit access to her," said Nikolai Polozov, another member of the defense team.

Russia's oldest human rights center, Memorial, declared Savchenko a political prisoner Friday, after which the Justice Ministry filed a suit to close the center for unknown reasons. The pilot's prosecution is a focal point of Moscow's allegations that Ukrainian forces have committed war crimes during the ongoing conflict. ... Memorial activist Sergei Davidis called Savchenko's trial "part of a big propaganda campaign against the Ukrainian government" based on war crime allegations. "She has specially been accused of the premeditated murder of Russian journalists even though the evidence in the case doesn't support such a conclusion," Davidis said.

Read more: https://news.vice.com/article/russia-begins-controversial-psychiatric-evaluation-of-captured-ukrainian-pilot

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The human rights center in Russia, one of the last bits of functioning civil society in Putin's dictatorship, has admitted the female pilot is a political prisoner. Russia now wants to subject her to psychiatric "tests," which sounds like something out of Stalinism. The pilot was abducted in Ukraine, brought to Russia, and then set up in this monkey trial over the deaths of Russian "journalists" killed while imbedded with the Russian proxy forces invading the Ukraine. More about the human rights case here: http://www.liberties.eu/en/news/abduction-nadiya-savchenko

The Bulgarian Helsinki Committee (BHC) is seriously concerned about the fate of Nadiya Savchenko, a Ukrainian Air Force pilot believed to have been abducted in July by separatists fighting against Ukrainian forces in the eastern regions of the country and subsequently transferred to the Russian authorities. She is currently in a detention facility in Voronezh, Russia, accused of complicity in the murder of two Russian journalists. Russian authorities claim that Nadiya Savchenko has not been abducted but was "found" after crossing the Russian border, claiming refugee status. However, factual evidence and the allegations of Savchenko after her arrest support the version of abduction.