Mom of jailed US-Israeli backpacker withdraws appeal against Russian hacker

The mother of an Israeli-American woman jailed in Russia on drug charges has asked the Justice Ministry to cancel the family’s petition requesting a delay in extraditing an alleged Russian hacker to the United States

“After a hard look at the situation, I decided to reverse my decision to appeal,” Yaffa Issachar is quoted as saying in Hebrew-language media outlets.

“Naama will not be a pawn for the Russian hacker and his people,” she says. “I pray that my decision will not aggravate Naama’s situation in Russian prison, and I fully trust in the president and the prime minister as they continue to work with the Russian president to bring about Naama’s immediate release.”

Naama Issachar and her mom Yaffa in a post to Issachar’s Instagram page in July 2018.

On Sunday, the High Court of Justice ordered a temporary halt to the extradition of Aleksey Burkov, an IT specialist, was arrested in Israel in 2015 at the request of Interpol. He is wanted in the US on embezzlement charges in a massive credit card scheme that saw him allegedly steal millions of dollars from American consumers.

Burkov’s pending extradition is believed by Israeli officials to be linked by Moscow to the seven-and-a-half-year prison sentence handed down by a Russian court earlier this month to Naama Issachar for alleged drug trafficking.