Ukraine to seek return of 70-year-old woman sentenced in Russia for donating to Armed Forces
Ukraine will demand the return of a pensioner who was convicted for making donations to the Armed Forces of Ukraine (Photo: The Occupation "Zaporizhzhya Oblast Court" / Screenshot from a Telegram video)
Ukraine will appeal to the Russian side for the return of 70-year-old Svitlana Loi, a resident of Tokmak in Zaporizhzhya Oblast who was sentenced in Russia to 15 years in prison over donations to the Ukrainian military, Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets told journalists on Aug. 27, according to hromadske.
The commissioner said his office had monitored the trial and recorded the sentence imposed on the woman for donating to the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
“As far as we know, all her guilt consists in the fact that she made a donation to one of the military units while physically being in the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine,” Lubinets said.
Kyiv will send requests to Moscow seeking Svitlana Loy’s return, urgent access to visit her, and information about her conditions of detention and state of health.
“Such a request is being prepared by me and will be sent to the Russian side tomorrow,” the ombudsman added.
Svitlana Loy received a Russian passport in 2023 because she was living in the occupied town of Tokmak, but she did not renounce her Ukrainian citizenship.
Russian authorities claim that from January through November 2024 she made 24 transfers in support of the Armed Forces of Ukraine totaling 63,420 rubles ($685). She sent the money from her Ukrainian pension through a Ukrainian bank's mobile app.
An occupation court sentenced Loy to 15 years in prison, accusing her of “anti-Russian views” and “treason.”
She later appealed the ruling, but a court in Moscow reviewed the case in recent days and left the sentence unchanged.
Before the verdict was announced, Svitlana Loy sang Pisnya pro rushnyk ("Ridna Maty Moya," or "Beloved Mother of Mine"), a well-known Ukrainian song with lyrics by Ukrainian poet Andrii Malyshko.
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