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The minister admitted that he was extremely happy to hear the news that Savchenko will be released.

President Raimonds Vejonis also expressed his joy at Savchenko's release through social media, while Prime Minister Maris Kucinskis said through his Twitter account that this points out that the efforts of the international community were not in vain.

Meanwhile, the Latvian Foreign Ministry has released a statement congratulating Savchenko on her return home and expresses satisfaction that the sustained support for her from the international community, including Latvia, has facilitated the resolution of the issue.

At the same time, the Foreign Ministry notes that several Ukrainian citizens are still being illegally detained in Russia and calls on Russia to also release these persons in compliance with the commitments made in the “Package of measures for the implementation of the Minsk Agreements” on the release of political hostages and illegally detained persons. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will be keeping focus on this matter.

The AFP news agency reports Ukrainian pilot Nadiya Savchenko returned home to a hero's welcome Wednesday after nearly two years in a Russian prison, drawing a line under a damaging diplomatic spat between Moscow and Kiev.

The 35-year-old army helicopter pilot flew home as part of an apparent prisoner swap with Moscow, with two alleged Russian soldiers leaving Ukraine earlier in the day.

"I'm ready to once again give my life for Ukraine on the battlefield," a defiant Savchenko declared as she touched down on home soil, wearing a white T-shirt bearing the Ukrainian trident, a national symbol.

A presidential motorcade was on standby at Kiev's main Boryspil airport to whisk Savchenko to Poroshenko's office where she was to be decorated by the president, two sources told AFP.

In Ukraine, she has become a symbol of resistance against what Kiev sees as Moscow's aggression in the east and has been elected to parliament in her absence.

Kiev and its Western allies view Savchenko as the latest pawn in Moscow's broader aggression against Ukraine that has seen Russia seize the Crimean peninsula and fuel the separatist uprising in 2014.

Savchenko's return will be seen in Ukraine as a rare political victory for Poroshenko, who has been struggling with mounting economic troubles, squabbles among his allies and festering violence in the east of the ex-Soviet country.

Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite on Wednesday welcomed the release of Ukraine's military pilot Nadiya Savchenko, but added that other illegally imprisoned Ukrainians cannot be forgotten.

"We are glad that Nadiya Savchenko has finally returned to Ukraine. However, we cannot forget other illegally imprisoned Ukrainians. The Minsk agreements on the release of prisoners of war must be implemented," Grybauskaite said in a comment sent to BNS by her press office.

Another two Ukrainians – Oleg Sentsov and Oleksandr Kolchenko – last August were sentenced by a Russian court to 20 and 10 years in prison, respectively, on terrorism charges.

Lithuania last April banned entry to people linked to the three Ukrainians' conviction in Russia.

Savchenko, who was sentenced to 22 years in jail, was released on Wednesday as part of a prisoner swap and was flown to Kiev aboard Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko's plane.

Estonian Foreign Minister Marina Kaljurand on Wednesday expressed gladness over the release of Ukrainian pilot and member of the parliament Nadiya Savchenko, and said that the whole trial was at variance with the principles of administration of justice.

"I am glad that Nadiya Savchenko who was unlawfully detained by Russia has by now safely returned to her homeland," Kaljurand was quoted by spokespeople as saying. "The whole process – Savchenko's detainment and her trial – were from the start at variance with the principles of administration of justice.

"Savchenko's case was not only Ukraine's concern. The concern was shared with the Estonian people, and the case that was substantially at variance with international law was under the attention of Europe from the beginning until the end," Kaljurand said.

Savchenko, an Iraq war veteran, was convicted in March over the killing of two Russian journalists in eastern Ukraine and sentenced to 22 years behind bars. She had been held in captivity in Russia since June 2014.

The crop-haired military helicopter pilot denies any involvement in the shelling deaths of two Russian state television reporters.