Russia: CCTV shows soldiers killing unarmed civilians
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A “brave” woman was arrested by Russian cops for “blasting audio recordings recounting details about Russian atrocities in Ukraine” in a video shared on social media. The video shows a Russian police officer climbing up the balcony of the woman who was recording the mishappenings.
Julia Davis, a columnist at The Daily Beast wrote: “A brave woman in St. Petersburg was blasting audio recordings recounting details about Russian atrocities in Ukraine, surpassing even the German Nazis in WWII in their cruelty.
“The cops climbed her balcony and arrested her. She was fined 50,000 rubles.”
Amid a mounting number of reports and testimonies pointing to possible war crimes in Ukraine, particularly in areas controlled until recently by Russian forces, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said that the pattern of abuses continued to be caused “by the use of explosive weapons with wide area effects in populated areas, such as shelling from heavy artillery, including multiple launch rocket systems, and missile and air strikes”.
Russian forces were likely responsible for most casualties, but so too Ukrainian troops – albeit to a far lesser extent – the UN rights chief said, in a video message.
Highlighting the latest harrowing findings of UN investigators in the Kyiv and Cherniviv regions, Ms Bachelet told the forum that 1,000 civilian bodies had been found in the Kyiv region alone.
Some had been killed in hostilities, but others appeared to have been summarily executed.
Ms Bachelet said: “These killings of civilians often appeared to be intentional, carried out by snipers and soldiers. Civilians were killed when crossing the road or leaving their shelters to seek food and water.
“Others were killed as they fled in their vehicles.”
She added: “In the village of Katiuzhanka, Kyiv region, a young couple, their 14-year-old daughter and a grandfather were shot by Russian soldiers while trying to drive to their house.
“The parents were killed, while the child received two gunshot wounds.”
Still others died because of stress to their health caused by hostilities and the lack of medical aid, the High Commissioner continued, describing how people had been forced to spend weeks in basements because they were threatened by Russian soldiers “with abuse or death” if they tried to leave.
Following Ms Bachelet’s remarks and noting that “the Russian Federation is not in the room”, Federico Villegas, President of the Human Rights Council gave the floor to Emine Dzheppar, First Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine.
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Since the beginning of the Ukraine war, UN-appointed independent rights experts known as Special Procedures have highlighted deep concerns over violations of international humanitarian and international human rights law, including the UN Charter.
These include an alert over the apparent ill-treatment of some of the hundreds of thousands of migrant workers and foreign nationals in Ukraine.
Chair of the Coordination Committee of Special Procedures, Victor Madrigal-Borloz said: “Colleagues had also noted with serious concern reports of people of African descent and racial and ethnic minorities being subjected to discriminatory treatment as they flee Ukraine.”
He insisted: “The lives of all people of Ukraine are in danger, including ethnic, national, linguistic and religious minorities.”
Ukraine’s top prosecutor disclosed plans on Wednesday for the first war crimes trial of a captured Russian soldier, as fighting raged in the east and south and the Kremlin entertained the possibility of annexing a corner of the country it seized early in the invasion.
Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova said her office charged Sgt. Vadin Shyshimarin, 21, in the killing of an unarmed 62-year-old civilian who was gunned down while riding a bicycle in February, four days into the war.
In his Wednesday night video address, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked the U.S. for a new $40 billion (£33 billion) US aid package, part of which, he said, would go toward investigating war crimes by Russia.
He voiced confidence that Ukraine will “fully liberate our land and our people”.
Many of the alleged atrocities came to light last month after Moscow’s forces aborted their bid to capture Kyiv and withdrew from around the capital, exposing mass graves and streets and yards strewn with bodies in towns such as Bucha.
Residents told of killings, burnings, rape, torture and dismemberment.
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