MOSCOW (Sputnik) – A Moscow court ruled on Tuesday to extend the pre-trial detention of Ukrainian military pilot Nadezhda Savchenko until May 13, a RIA Novosti correspondent reported from the courtroom.
The defense asked to release the detained on bail “on any sum that the court decides possible.”
Savchenko has been in pre-trial detention in Russia since last summer, as a suspected accomplice in the killing of two Russian journalists during the early stages of the conflict in eastern Ukraine.
During the hearing, the pilot, who has been on a hunger strike for about two months, once again pleaded not guilty and said that she would press ahead with her protest.
The prosecution said that Savchenko may impede the investigation should she be released.
Russian investigators claim that Savchenko passed the coordinates for a mortar attack near the eastern Ukrainian city of Luhansk on June 17, 2014. As a result of the attack, two Russian journalists, Igor Kornelyuk and Anton Voloshin, were fatally wounded.