Zelensky accuses Russia of ‘genocide’, US president calls for war crimes trial

International outrage spread yesterday over civilian killings in northern Ukraine, where a mass grave and tied bodies of people shot at close range were found in a town taken back from Russian forces, as Moscow shifted the focus of the fighting elsewhere.
The deaths in Bucha, outside Kyiv, are likely to galvanise the United States and Europe into additional sanctions against Moscow, possibly including some restrictions on the billions of dollars in energy that Europe still imports from Russia.
The discoveries overshadowed peace talks between Russia and Ukraine that were due to resume this week against a backdrop of artillery barrages in Ukraine’s south and east, where Moscow says it is now focusing its operations after it fell short in attempts to take any major cities in the heart of the country.
“These are war crimes and will be recognised by the world as genocide,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said on a visit to Bucha.
Taras Shapravskyi, deputy mayor of the town some 40km (25 miles) northwest of the capital Kyiv, said around 50 victims of extra-judicial killings by Russian troops had been found there after Kremlin forces withdrew late last week.
Reuters saw one man sprawled by the roadside, his hands bound behind his back and a bullet wound to his head.
The Kremlin categorically denied any accusations related to the murder of civilians, including in Bucha.
“This information must be seriously questioned,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters. “From what we have seen, our experts have identified signs of video falsification and other fakes.”
Ukrainian authorities said they had found 421 civilian casualties near Kyiv by Sunday and were investigating possible war crimes in Bucha, a description also used by French President Emmanuel Macron and, in reference to Russia’s broader offensive, by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
Reuters saw more makeshift burials elsewhere but could not independently verify the number of dead or who was responsible.
AFP on Saturday saw the bodies of at least 22 people in civilian clothes on a single street in Bucha.
Satellite imagery firm Maxar released pictures it said showed a mass grave located in the grounds of a church in Bucha.
Before leaving the city, Russian forces refused to let residents bury the dead, municipal worker Serhii Kaplychnyi told AFP.
Eventually, they were able to retrieve the bodies, he said. “We dug a mass grave with a tractor and buried everyone.”
In the village of Motyzhyn, west of Kyiv, Reuters reporters saw three bodies in a forest grave.
An adviser to Ukraine’s interior ministry said the victims were the village’s leader, Olha Sukhenko, her husband Ihor and son Oleksandr.
Ihor, a local resident who said he was a relative of the family and did not give his surname, told Reuters: “I don’t know what they were killed for. They were peaceful, kind people.”
Zelensky has used the term genocide at various times during the war, decrying what he calls an intent to eliminate the nation by Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, who has questioned Ukraine’s legitimate, independent history from Russia.
Yesterday US President Joe Biden repeated his accusation that Putin was a war criminal and he called for a war crimes trial.
Putin “is brutal. And what’s happening in Bucha is outrageous, and everyone’s seen it”, Biden told reporters. “We have to gather the information. We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue the fight. And we have to get all the detail so this can be an actual, have a war crimes trial.”
The United States also said it would seek to suspend Russia from the UN Human Rights Council and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said urgent discussions were underway on tougher sanctions against Russia.
Russia has denied targeting civilians and rejected allegations of war crimes in what it calls a “special military operation” aimed at demilitarising and “denazifying” Ukraine.
European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said the European Union was ready to send a team of investigators to gather evidence of possible war crimes.
On the other side of the country in Mariupol, a southeastern port that has been under siege for weeks, Reuters images showed three bodies in civilian clothes lying in the street, one against a wall sprayed with blood.
Outside a damaged apartment building, residents buried other dead in a shell crater.
“It is easier to dig here,” a resident said, saying four bodies were in the improvised grave.
Ukraine says it has evacuated thousands of civilians in the past few days from the city, which is surrounded by areas held by Russian-backed separatists in the eastern Donbas region.
Several attempts by International Committee of the Red Cross teams to reach the besieged city in recent days have been unsuccessful, and a spokesman for the organisation said it was again unable to enter yesterday to evacuate civilians.
Europe’s worst conflict in decades, sparked by Russia’s invasion on February 24, has already killed 20,000 people, according to Ukrainian estimates.
Nearly 4.2mn Ukrainians have fled the country, with almost 40,000 pouring into neighbouring countries in the last 24 hours alone, the UN refugee agency said.