VORONEZH, August 27 (RAPSI) – A court in the southern city of Voronezh has extended until October 30 the detention of Ukrainian pilot Nadezhda Savchenko stands accused of having abetted the killings of two Russian journalists, her attorney Nikolai Polozov told RAPSI Wednesday.

The attorney asked the court to release Savchenko on 1-million-rubles (around $30,000) bail. 

Savchenko, 33, is a Ukrainian pilot who called in artillery fire via radio. She was seized by anti-Maidan fighters in June but, according to the independence supporters in the Lugansk area, managed to escape. Later she was detained in Russia, which she allegedly entered as a refugee, and charged with complicity in the murder of Russian journalists.

The pilot’s attorneys say she was not actively involved in the military operations.

The defense team and Ukrainian Consul Hennadiy Breskalenko visited Savchenko at the pretrial detention center on July 16. They said she told them that she was forcibly transported to Russia in handcuffs and with a sack over her head after being captured near Lugansk on June 18.

Vesti correspondent Igor Kornelyuk and sound engineer Anton Voloshin were killed on June 17 in a mortar attack in the vicinity of Metallist and Mirny, small towns near Lugansk in eastern Ukraine. They were buried at the Troyekurovskoye Cemetery in Moscow.