Officials said a mass burial site with at least 440 bodies was discovered in the recaptured Ukrainian city of Izyum. According to officials, some of the victims may have died as a result of shelling and airstrikes.
According to Reuters, some of the bodies were discovered with ropes around their necks and their hands tied.
According to Ukraine’s defense ministry, mass graves were discovered in the city after it was retaken from Russia, with the largest burial site having 440 unmarked graves.
According to Reuters, some of the bodies were discovered with ropes around their necks and their hands tied, indicating torture. According to Ukraine’s Center for Strategic Communications, a mass grave with over 400 bodies was discovered on Friday. According to the report, some of the graves were “new,” and the deceased were “mostly civilians.”
“The Russian invaders perpetrated the same heinous terror everywhere they went,” it said.
The head of President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s office, Andriy Yermak, tweeted on Thursday that dozens of wooden crosses had been discovered in a forest outside of the city in the eastern Kharkiv region.
The defense ministry, the communications center, and Yermak all shared images of multiple wooden crosses interspersed among trees.
“The required procedures have already begun. All bodies will be exhumed and forensically examined “Yermak stated. “Russia is a murderer country. A state sponsor of terrorism,” he wrote.
It is unknown what happened to all of the victims.
However, the Kharkiv region’s chief police investigator, Serhii Bolvinov, told reporters on Thursday that some of them may have died as a result of shelling and airstrikes, according to Sky News.
“We know that some were killed [shot dead], and others died as a result of artillery fire or mine explosion trauma. Some people were killed as a result of airstrikes “According to Sky News, Bolvinov told reporters.
“We also have information that many bodies have yet to be identified.”
“It was especially shocking and horrific for me, and it is a crime against humanity. This should not be happening in a civilized world in 2022 “According to Sky News, he went on to say. Izyum, which has a population of about 45,000 people, was one of many villages, towns, and cities recaptured by Ukrainian troops this month in a lightning offensive in the Kharkiv region.
Russian forces had occupied the city for five months.
According to the BBC, Zelenskyy visited Izyum on Wednesday, where he oversaw a ceremony raising the Ukrainian flag and met with soldiers on the front lines.
In his nightly address on Thursday, he compared the city’s suffering to the apparent atrocities committed by Russian forces in Bucha, a Kyiv suburb, and Mariupol, a southern port city.
“Russia leaves death everywhere,” Zelenskyy said in his speech. And it must be held responsible for this. The world must hold Russia to real account for this war. We will do everything for this.”
In both Bucha and Mariupol, Ukrainian forces discovered mass graves and evidence of war crimes.
The United Nations is investigating possible war crimes in Bucha, and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken stated in April that the events in Bucha were part of a “deliberate campaign to kill, torture, rape, and commit atrocities.”
