Kiev alleges that Russian troops decapitated a soldier.
Russian forces, according to Ukrainian authorities, are purchasing captured Ukrainian soldiers near the Eastern Front, allegedly under orders from Kremlin commanders not to take prisoner any Ukrainian troops in the Wolnowacha region of Donetsk.
Kiev claims that Russian troops decapitated a Ukrainian soldier near the Eastern frontline in Ukraine. "Evidence suggests that commanders of the Russian occupation forces in the Wolnowacha region of Donetsk have issued orders to refrain from capturing Ukrainian soldiers," the Ukrainian General Prosecutor's Office announced on Telegram. A soldier's head was discovered during an aerial reconnaissance on a military vehicle.
Andriy Kostin, the General Prosecutor, identified this as a clear violation of the Geneva Convention and vowed that it would not go unpunished. "This is a heinous act of barbarism with no place in the modern world," Kostin wrote on X about a drone video showing an unidentified item on the hood of a damaged military vehicle. Kostin urged the "entire civilized world to isolate and sanction the terrorist country." Moscow remained silent in response to the allegation.
Ukraine has accused Russia of committing atrocities at the front since the start of the war in February 2022. As part of a Ten-Point Peace Plan, Kiev demands the creation of a special court to investigate the crimes.
An expert reported a significant increase in the number of alleged Russian war crimes recently. Currently, over 133,000 investigative proceedings have been launched. That's a "massive spike," said German advisor to the Ukrainian General Prosecutor Klaus Hoffmann in an interview with the "Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung" at the beginning of June. By the end of 2022, there were approximately 56,000 such proceedings.
Hoffmann cited Russian air raids on civilian targets and kidnappings and forced adoptions of Ukrainian children as examples. He declined to pass judgment prematurely, but his personal opinion was that the Russian actions could only be described as "terrorism against the civilian population."
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The Ukrainian General Prosecutor's Office condemns the decapitation of a Ukrainian soldier near the Eastern frontline as a war crime, attributed to Russian forces. Amidst escalating allegations of Russian atrocities in Ukraine, the number of investigative proceedings into war crimes has increased significantly, with over 133,000 ongoing as of recent reports.
