Indictment for Savchenko sent to Donetsk City Court, Rostov region – Russian PGO

The Russian Prosecutor General's Office has approved an indictment for Ukrainian citizen Nadia Savchenko and sent the criminal case to court, the Russian Prosecutor General's Office reported on Monday.

"Russian Deputy Russian Prosecutor General Viktor Grin has approved an indictment for the criminal case against Nadia Savchenko. The case has been sent to the Donetsk City Court, Rostov region, to be tried on its merits," the report says.

"The investigators believe that Nadia Savchenko, being an officer of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, conducted hidden observation and navigated artillery attacks on a militia checkpoint area in the Luhansk People's Republic and civilians who were there, including three Russian citizens who were VGTRK journalists, when she was in the place where the militarized battalion Aidar was deployed in the area of the settlement of Metalist, Slovyanoserbsk district of the Luhansk region, on June 17, 2014. Two Russians were killed in the attack," the Russian Prosecutor General's Office has reported.

Investigators also believe Savchenko "acting deliberately, secretly crossed the Russian-Ukrainian state border in the Luhansk region of Ukraine in the area of the local border checkpoint Donetsk-Severny outside the relevant checkpoint no later than June 23, 2014."

According to earlier reports, the Russian Investigative Committee officially completed the investigation into the criminal case against Savchenko.

Savchenko has been held in Russia since July 2014 over complicity in the murder of Russian journalists Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin in the Luhansk region.

On April 24, she was charged with complicity in the killing of two or more people, complicity in the killing of two or more people using methods posing a danger to the public based on political hatred by a group of people and illegally crossing the Russian border.

Savchenko denies her guilt. She has gone on a hunger strike several times in protest against her arrest and charges. She is now trying to keep physically fit, preparing for her trial.

Savchenko headed the Batkivschyna party list at an early election to the Verkhovna Rada on October 26 and was elected Ukrainian people's deputy. The Verkhovna Rada later included her in the Ukrainian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE).