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Ukraine regained ground around kyiv, where its forces discovered a horrific sight, with many civilians massacred by the Russian army. Many are those who call for a procedure for “war crimes”.
As Ukrainian troops recaptured Boutcha, numerous war crimes charges are leveled at the Russian military.
AFP
Ukraine on Sunday accused the Russian army of committing a “deliberate massacre” in Boutcha, after the discovery of numerous corpses in this city northwest of kyiv, which sparked outrage from European and British officials, the very day the UN attempts a mission in Moscow.
According to Ukraine, the localities of Irpin, Boucha, Gostomel and the entire kyiv region “have been liberated from the invader”, which is abandoning key towns near the capital as well as Cherniguiv, in the north of the country, to redeploy to the east and south and “maintain control” of the territories it occupies there.
But the Russians leave behind them “a total disaster and many dangers”, denounced Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Facebook, accusing them of “mining the territories they are leaving, houses, ammunition and even corpses”.
“Violations of the Laws of War”
In a statement on Sunday, the human rights organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) denounced abuses against civilians that amounted to “war crimes” by Russian soldiers in the Cherniguiv regions. , Kharkiv and Kyiv. HRW says it has documented several cases of “violations of the laws of war”, citing that of a woman repeatedly raped and beaten by a Russian soldier, the summary executions of seven men, “other cases of violence” and ” threats against civilians”, as well as looting.
In Boutcha, an AFP journalist saw the bodies of about twenty men lying in a street on Saturday. These people were “all killed with a bullet in the back of the head”, according to Anatoly Fedorouk, the mayor of this city taken back from the Russians, where nearly 300 corpses were buried in mass graves. “We found mass graves. We found people with their hands and legs tied up and with bullet holes in the back of their heads,” the spokesman for the Ukrainian president, Serguiy Nikiforovil, told the BBC. “They were clearly civilians and they were executed.” “It looks exactly like war crimes,” he said.
‘Eliminate as many Ukrainians as they can’
“The Boutcha massacre was deliberate. The Russians want to eliminate as many Ukrainians as they can. We have to stop them and put them out. I demand devastating new G7 sanctions NOW,” Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote on Twitter.
The President of the European Council, Charles Michel, also said, on Twitter, “shocked by the haunting images of atrocities committed by the Russian army in the liberated region of kyiv”. “The EU is helping Ukraine and NGOs to gather the necessary evidence for prosecution in international courts,” he said, adding: “More EU sanctions and help are on the way. .”
British Foreign Minister Liz Truss denounced on Sunday the “revolting acts” committed by the Russian army against civilians in Ukraine, particularly in Boutcha, calling for a “war crimes investigation”. “As Russian troops are forced to retreat, we see growing evidence of the appalling acts committed by the invading forces in towns like Irpin and Boutcha,” she said. “Their indiscriminate attacks on innocent civilians during Russia’s unlawful and unjustified invasion of Ukraine must be investigated for war crimes!”
“We will not allow Russia to hide its involvement in these atrocities through cynical disinformation,” continued the head of diplomacy. She assured that the United Kingdom would “fully support any investigation by the International Criminal Court” and called once again to “increase the sanctions” against Russia.
(AFP)