Tymoshenko: Obama and Merkel have convinced Putin to transfer Savchenko to Ukraine
According to the leader of the Ukrainian political party Batkivshchyna (Fatherland), Yulia Tymoshenko, US President Barack Obama and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have convinced Russian President Vladimir Putin to transfer Nadiya Savchenko to Ukraine, as reported by Deutsche Welle.
On Friday, on the TV program “Shuster Live”, Tymoshenko expressed confidence that the three leaders had reached an agreement that will allow Savchenko to be transferred to Ukraine.
"According to our information, a decision was made... to transfer her to Ukraine," Tymoshenko said. According to her, this will happen either as a result of an exchange or "under the international legislation that allows [Savchenko] to carry out her sentence in Ukraine."
Tymoshenko stated that the agreement was reached during talks in which Obama and Merkel persuaded Putin to “give up Nadiya.”
"I hope that this will happen," the leader of the Batkivshchyna party added.
Last Tuesday, a Russian court found Savchenko guilty of complicity in the killing of two Russian journalists and sentenced her to 22 years in prison.
The judge in the Russian town of Donetsk said Savchenko had been driven by "political hatred".
"A propaganda machine is at work here, absent of justice and freedom," Savchenko’s lawyer wrote on Twitter.
It is widely believed that Savchenko was in fact captured by Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) separatists in eastern Ukraine and was illegally transported to Russia, where the case was fabricated against her.
Savchenko was elected to the Ukrainian Verkhovna Rada in absentia in October of 2014 and became an official delegate of the PACE several months later.
Rallies in support of her immediate release have taken place in Ukraine, Russia and other countries around the World, and many Western leaders consider the case to be little more than a show trial.