AKIPRESS.COM - A Russian court sentenced Ukrainian pilot Nadezhda Savchenko to 22 years in jail after finding her guilty of involvement in the killing of two Russian journalists during the separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine.

Savchenko, 34, who has become a national hero in Ukraine, was defiant as the verdict was read out on Tuesday, singing the Ukrainian national anthem while standing on a bench, reports Al Jazeera.

She has denied having anything to do with the deaths of the journalists who were killed in an air strike in 2014. Savchenko was accused of calling in the coordinates.

The sentence is likely to further inflame Russia's relations with Kiev, and prompt protests from the European Union, which has called for Savchenko's release.

President Petro Poroshenko said Ukraine will never recognize the sentencing by a Russian "kangaroo court".

Savchenko, who had taken leave from her job as a military pilot to volunteer with Ukraine's ground forces fighting against the separatists in eastern Ukraine, was captured by pro-Moscow rebels in June 2014.

She has repeatedly gone on hunger strike, and from the glass and metal cage where she has been held in the courtroom, has often shouted her view that she is the victim of a show trial aimed at humiliating Ukraine.

In her absence, she was elected a member of the Ukrainian parliament.