President Zelensky declared that Russia has “left death everywhere” and will be “held accountable” in the wake of the discovery of a new mass grave site in the recently freed city of Izyum that included at least 440 victims.
The facility was discovered yesterday evening in the eastern Donbas region’s woodlands, days after Ukrainian troops reclaimed the region after it had been under Russian siege for four months.
Some of the burials, according to the investigators, appear to be those of civilians, while others had military insignia.
Only numerals are used to identify some of the pits. Although the exact cause of death is still unknown, the Ukrainians claim that some of the victims most likely perished in battle while others may have been hit by shelling and succumbed to their injuries.
Exhumation at the site has started as police look for possible war crimes. Although they haven’t yet levelled specific accusations against Russia, evidence from other liberated areas indicates atrocities have probably been committed.
In addition to digging up graves of people whose bodies exhibit signs of summary execution and have been mangled, prosecutors have so far discovered Russian torture facilities. People have also related tales of rapes, forced disappearances, arbitrary detention, and other horrors, including being electrocuted during interrogation sessions.
When Zelensky linked Izyum to Mariupol and Bucha, two cities where Russia has deliberately killed civilians in what have been referred to as crimes against humanity, he made a hint at war crimes.
“We want the world to understand the reality and the consequences of the Russian occupation.” He mentioned Bucha, Mariupol, and now, regrettably, Izyum. “Death is left everywhere in Russia.” And it needs to be held responsible.
The bodies will be unearthed and transported for forensic testing, according to Serhii Bolvinov, head police investigator for the Kharkiv region.
It is a component of a significant police operation in which the cops collaborate with prosecutors and other detectives to find evidence of atrocities.
After finding the mass grave, Mr. Bolvinov told Sky News, “For me, it was very frightening and awful, and this is a crime against humanity.” In 2022, this is not how a civilised society should operate. From whatever perspective, this is such a terrible and sad story.
When asked how the victims had perished, Mr. Bolvinov replied that some had been shot, others had perished from artillery fire, and still others had perished in airstrikes.
Given that many of the remains have not yet been recognized, he said that additional examinations will be conducted to determine possible causes of death.
According to numerous Ukrainian officials, at least 1,000 civilians have perished in Izyum alone, and others have been left to suffer from injuries brought on by Russian troops who destroyed all the hospitals and pillaged the medical supplies.
In chilling echoes of their retreat from Kyiv, more horrifying accounts of mass murder, torture, rape, and mutilation at the hands of Russian troops are being revealed in other recently liberated areas.
People who survived the occupation in places like Balakliya and Kupyansk recount the rapes, mutilations, and torture carried out by Putin’s men – some without discrimination and others in an effort to find Ukrainian loyalists.
The names of these cities will now join the likes of Bucha and Irpin, Kyiv suburbs where some of the initial evidence of Russia’s bloody campaign of violence against innocent bystanders was first discovered after the retreat in April, in living infamy.
It is known that over 450 people perished close to Kyiv, indicating that the atrocities in Izyum and other parts of Kharkiv were much more widespread.
The occupiers committed war crimes here as well as in other places, according to Izyum City Council President Maksim Strelnikov, and tried to cover them up.
The information we have indicates that at least 1,000 civilians died as a result of military operations.
Sadly, a lot more people have suffered as a result of their inability to access timely medical care.
Anton Gerashchenko, a presidential adviser, Iuliia Mendel, a former presidential spokesperson, and Valery Marchenko, the mayor of Izyum, all echoed his sentiments.
While yesterday on a trip to the area, Mr. Gerashchenko continued, “Right now, being in Kharkiv, I feel joy and anger.
“Those factories and infrastructure were destroyed.” Russia must foot the bill.
More than twenty teams of investigators have been dispatched by Ukraine’s state prosecutor into the more than 3,000 square miles of territory that Ukraine reclaimed from Russia in a quicksand offensive that started last week.
At least six bodies of civilians who were allegedly killed by the Russians have so far been found by investigators.
Locals in the village of Hrakove guided investigators to the graves of two young men they claim Russian soldiers forced them to bury.
The bodies were exhumed by investigators, who found evidence of torture and a quick death.
Each has a head wound from a gunshot to the back. They had lost their ears.
Locals in the village of Zaliznychne guided Ukrainian soldiers to four graves they claimed held the remains of their neighbours who had been murdered by Putin’s men.
The fourth was found inside a tarmac plant next to the local train station, while the other three had been buried in their gardens. All, according to the prosecution, exhibit symptoms of torture.
A former journalist turned soldier from Ukraine named Oleksii Kashporovskyi spoke to the news outlet TSN about the horrors he saw while liberating the town of Bohorodychne.
Along with the dead of 10 people, Kashporovskyi claimed to have discovered five decapitated, barefoot Ukrainian troops.
A 93-year-old woman and her 60-year-old son were the only two civilians in the village still alive. The 60-year-old son described how the Russians had shot another of the woman’s sons and his wife.
She led Ukrainians to the location of where she buried the dead behind her home.
A vet from Kupyansk named Yulia Petrova spoke to the news outlet Meduza about her time living under Russian rule before she was able to escape last month.
She said that Russian forces set up torture cells in the basements of buildings where both male and female “inhuman cries” could be heard.
Villagers were urged to report any pro-Ukraine sympathizers, including their relatives and neighbors, who were later abducted.
After being tortured, several people emerged from the cellars unable to walk or stand. Others vanished without a trace.
A victim with its wrists tied and its head in a bag was discovered floating in a nearby river, according to local fisherman.
The local Russian commander was alerted, and without more comment, troops removed the body.
On occasion, inebriated Russian troops would randomly approach strangers on the street and threaten to shoot them.
Yulia revealed why she made the decision to leave once the occupants showed there because someone had reported her for holding pro-Ukraine beliefs.
When they couldn’t discover any Ukrainian flags or emblems, she said that military broke into her home, searched it, looked through her phone, and then held a loaded rifle at her daughter, 9, in an effort to force a confession.
The next day, Yulia escaped, taking a lift in a friend’s vehicle and paying her way past security checks until she entered Ukrainian borders.
A subterranean torture room, according to the Ukrainians, was revealed to BBC reporters who visited the city of Balakliya.
Anyone they perceived to be a member of the army or government was brutally detained by Russian forces on the lower levels of the police station.
In cells intended for only two or three persons, up to eight men were detained for weeks at a time while being interrogated, often while being electrocuted.
Locals claim that during the torture sessions, the Russians cut off the building’s loud ventilation system so that the victims’ cries could be heard outside.
The strategies are identical replicas of the atrocities committed against the Russian-occupied towns of Bucha and Irpin during the months of February and April.
Local investigators and other observers have gathered evidence of torture, enforced disappearances, and summary killings that constitute war crimes and maybe crimes against humanity.
There are 458 known deaths in Bucha and Irpin, many of whom were rolled into mass graves that Ukrainian troops eventually dug up.
International criticism of Russia’s war effort and a surge of support for Ukraine followed the revelation of the killings.
Zelensky and a number of other international leaders declared them to be crimes against humanity and referred to Putin as a war criminal, promising to hold those involved accountable.
Ukraine claims to have now identified and posted online the names of several of the troops and their commanders who were there at the time.
Russia maintains its denial that its military intentionally targets people.