World

Ukrainian lawmaker stripped of immunity on coup charges

22 of March 2018

FILE - This is a Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2017 file photo of Ukrainian lawmaker Nadiya Savchenko as she speaks to the media in Kiev, Ukraine. Ukraine's parliament on Tuesday March 20, 2018 approved a bill requiring lawmakers to lock up their guns before entering the chamber. The bill that obliges lawmakers to leave weapons and explosives in lockers follows last week’s statement by Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko, who accused lawmaker Nadiya Savchenko, of plotting an attack on parliament with grenades and automatic weapons. (AP Photo/Sergei Chuzavkov, file),FILE - This is a Tuesday, Feb. 28, 2017 file photo of Ukrainian lawmaker Nadiya Savchenko as she speaks to the media in Kiev, Ukraine. Ukraine's parliament on Tuesday March 20, 2018 approved a bill requiring lawmakers to lock up their guns before entering the chamber. The bill that obliges lawmakers to leave weapons and explosives in lockers follows last week’s statement by Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko, who accused lawmaker Nadiya Savchenko, of plotting an attack on parliament with grenades and automatic weapons. (AP Photo/Sergei Chuzavkov, file)

The Ukrainian parliament has stripped a former military pilot who became a national icon after spending time in a Russian prison of her immunity as a lawmaker on charges of plotting a military coup. In Thursday's speech to lawmakers, Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko accused Savchenko of plotting an attack on parliament with hand grenades and automatic weapons. She says she knew she was being wiretapped and said things to mock what she calls Ukraine's failed government.

MOSCOW (AP) — The Ukrainian parliament has stripped a former military pilot who became a national icon after spending time in a Russian jail of her immunity as a lawmaker on charges of plotting a military coup.

In Thursday’s speech to lawmakers, Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko accused Nadiya Savchenko of plotting an attack on parliament with hand grenades and automatic weapons.

Lutsenko claimed that Savchenko was acting in cahoots with Russia-backed rebels in eastern Ukraine to stage a “terrorist coup in the interests of Ukraine’s enemies.” He presented wiretapped recordings in which Savchenko was talking about smuggling weapons from the east.

Savchenko told lawmakers she was aware of being wiretapped and talked about such attacks as a “surrealist political provocation” to mock the government that she said has failed the public’s hopes.