You're reading: Kyiv working round-the-clock to return female pilot detained by Russia – officials

Ukraine is taking all possible steps to secure the release of its army pilot Nadia Savchenko, who has been placed in a Russian detention facility, according to several high-ranking government officials.

“In line with the president’s instruction, all channels have been engaged to return our pilot to Ukraine,” Andriy Lysenko, a spokesman for the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council information and analytical center, said at a news conference on July 9.

These measures include diplomatic channels, while the Prosecutor General’s Office and Justice Ministry should ensure legal support for these measures, he said.

“As soon as we return her, then we will learn all details that she would tell us,” Lysenko said.

Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin said the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry is taking all possible measures virtually round-the-clock to have Savchenko released.

“We are working on this virtually round-the-clock. First, we have made a demarche and issued a statement and also presented a diplomatic note. Our consul is there [in Voronezh] today, and he was there yesterday. Certainly, we have reported this information to the entire international community,” Klimkin told journalists before a government meeting in Kyiv on July 9.

Klimkin stressed that the incident goes against international law as well as legal and moral standards.

Ukrainian Prosecutor General Vitaliy Yarema said earlier at a news conference in Kyiv that Ukraine would take all possible steps to secure Savchenko’s release after she was captured by Donbas militants and then placed at a Russian detention facility in Voronezh.

Savchenko, a 31-year-old navigator, was captured in June near the town of Schastia, a suburb of Luhansk, following 30 days of fighting as a member of the Aidar volunteer battalion. Some media reported that the militants were prepared to swap the pilot but negotiations on her release had been disrupted several times.