A Ukrainian soldiers surveys the wreckage of a destroyed Russian armoured vehicle on the outskirts of Kyiv<\/p>\n
We recommend readers view the following with the utmost scepticism. Why would the Russian Army shoot fleeing Ukrainian civilians? What purpose would it serve other to alienate and antagonise the remaining local population?<\/p>\n
According to the Guardian report below, some civilians appear to have been killed execution style, blindfolded with their hands tied behind their backs, while others were dumped in mass graves. Put that together with \u201cburned-out Russian tanks and military vehicles\u201d \u2013 which could easily be Ukrainian military vehicles dating from the post Soviet years \u2013 and this all sounds suspiciously as if it has been staged.<\/p>\n
I realise that collateral casualties are a part of modern war but the deliberate slaughter of civilians would be of absolutely no benefit to Russian forces.<\/p>\n
It would however, be of immense propaganda value to Ukraine\u2019s pro-Western government. As a result we shouldn\u2019t rule out the possibility that this has all been carefully staged-managed for the international MSM to report on.<\/p>\n
After all, there are multiple reports of the Nazi Azov battalion using civilians as human shields<\/a> in Mariupol. So if the Ukrainians were prepared to resort to such measures in Mariupol, why not in Bucha, a town north-west of the capital?<\/p>\n Unfortunately, I think we can expect to see a lot more similar reports in the coming weeks as the conflict in Ukraine intensifies on the propaganda front. Ed.<\/p>\n The retreat of Russian forces around Kyiv has left horrifying evidence of atrocities against civilians littered across the region\u2019s suburbs and towns, turned into hellish war zones by Vladimir Putin\u2019s invasion.<\/p>\n As Ukrainian armoured columns rolled into Bucha, a town north-west of the capital, they found streets blocked by burned-out Russian tanks and military vehicles, and strewn with the bodies of civilians whom locals said had been killed by the invading forces without provocation.<\/p>\n Photographs from the town showed a scene of devastation, with hunks of charred and destroyed tanks and armoured vehicles lined up along one street, along with dead bodies.<\/p>\n Reporters from Agence France-Presse saw at least 20 bodies, all in civilian clothing, strewn across a single street in Bucha, and the body of a missing Ukrainian photographer, Maksim Levin,<\/a> was discovered in a nearby village.<\/p>\n Three of them were tangled up in bicycles after taking their final ride, while others had fallen next to bullet-ridden and crushed cars, AFP reported.<\/p>\n One had his hands tied behind his back with a white cloth, and his Ukrainian passport left open beside his corpse, said journalists who accessed the ravaged town.<\/p>\n \u201cAll these people were shot,\u201d Bucha\u2019s mayor Anatoly Fedoruk told AFP, adding that 280 other bodies had been buried in mass graves in the town. \u201cThese are the consequences of Russian occupation.\u201d<\/p>\n Ukrainian soldiers in Bucha, who were welcomed warmly by residents of the town, attached cables to the bodies and pulled them off the street for fear they may be booby-trapped<\/a>.<\/p>\n Soldiers also cleared barricades and inspected suspicious objects, placing red rags on remnants of unexploded ordnance to draw attention to the possibility of explosions.<\/p>\n As the town was liberated, one woman, Halyna Tovkach, 55, told the Guardian<\/a> that she was searching for the body of her husband, Oleg, 62. He was killed by Russian soldiers along with their neighbours, two young boys and their mother, as they tried to escape the town on 5 March. \u201cIt is a war crime,\u201d said Tovkach\u2019s son.<\/p>\n Also allegedly among the civilians killed by the Russians <\/a>was Olha Sukhenko, the head of the village of Motyzhin east of Kyiv, and her entire family.<\/p>\n And in another accusation of war crimes, Russian troops allegedly used children as \u201chuman shields\u201d<\/a> while regrouping.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n\u2018They were all shot\u2019: Russia accused of war crimes as Bucha reveals horror of invasion<\/strong><\/h2>\n
Daniel Boffey \u2013 The Guardian April 3, 2022<\/h3>\n