Russian Human Rights Ombudsperson Tatyana Moskalkova plans to once again ask the US authorities to extradite pilot Konstantin Yaroshenko, who is serving a 20-year sentence in the in the Danbury prison in Connecticut, to Russia, as she herself said in a statement published on her website.
“I continue to monitor the situation concerning Yaroshenko’s rights in the US prison and I will once again ask the US authorities to extradite him in light of his poor health so that he can serve out the remainder of his prison term in Russia,” Moskalkova said.
She was hopeful that the US authorities would “show humanity and give a positive response to this request based on the principle of reciprocity.”
Yaroshenko’s wife Viktoria said earlier that doctors at the Danbury prison had removed benign tumors from his stomach. Before that, Yaroshenko had written a letter to Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov, asking for assistance in his transfer to another jail for he was being denied medical help. Yaroshenko said that he was not able to eat normally due to toothache and stomach issues.
Yaroshenko was arrested in Liberia in May 2010, and was later clandestinely transferred to the United States. In September 2011, he was found guilty of conspiring to smuggle a major cocaine shipment into the US, and sentenced to 20 years behind bars. However, Yaroshenko pleaded not guilty, saying that his arrest was a setup and the case was fabricated.
The Russian was first sent to the Fort Dix Federal Correctional Institution, but in mid-June, 2018, he was first transferred to a transit prison in Brooklyn, New York, and then to the Danbury prison, which holds more than 1,400 inmates.
Russian officials and the pilot’s family have on numerous occasions requested that Washington extradite him to Russia.