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A Ukrainian soldier roams through the liberated Bucha
Photo Credit: IMAGO/Mykhaylo Palinchak/ IMAGO/ZUMA Wire
The human rights organization "Human Rights Watch" has compiled numerous pieces of evidence of massive war crimes by Russian soldiers in Ukraine.
In the report published on Sunday, the organization describes cases of rape, two executions and several other assaults and looting by Kremlin troops.
In all cases, the human rights activists were able to interview witnesses on the spot and by telephone.
What has been documented "reveals unspeakable, deliberate violence and brutality against Ukrainian civilians," said Hugh Williamson, Europe director at Human Rights Watch.
"Rape, murder and other violent attacks against people at the hands of Russian troops should be investigated as war crimes."
Specifically, the organization investigated cases in the Chernihiv, Kharkiv and Kiev region in the first two weeks shortly after the start of the Russian invasion.
Among the crimes is a case from the recaptured Bucha north of Kyiv.
Ukrainian troops liberated the city on Saturday and found dozens of dead people lying on the streets.
Among them were many civilians.
Human Rights Watch reports the testimony of a woman who witnessed Russian troops execute a man in Bucha.
He and four other people had to kneel down.
He was then shot in the back of the head.
Witness account: Taken from the house and shot
Other cases described by the human rights organization:
In
Staryi Bykiv
, a village near Chernihiv, Russian soldiers are said to have rounded up six men on the street and executed them.
The mother of one of the murdered witnesses to the incident.
"They went out into the smoke," she said as the soldiers took her son away.
She was told not to worry, they were just scaring the men a little.
"We ran after about 50 meters ... then we heard the shots." All six men were tied up and had bullet holes in their heads.
A 31-year-old from the Kharkiv region reports that she was
raped several times by a Russian soldier in a school in the village of
Mala Rohan .
She had found shelter in the building with several refugee families.
The soldier inflicted injuries on her face and neck with a knife.
Among other things, he forced her to perform oral sex, says the 31-year-old.
“The whole time he was holding a gun to my temple.
Twice he shot the ceiling and said it was to 'motivate' me more."
Kremlin troops are said to have thrown a smoke grenade into a house in
the Kiev suburb of
Worsel .
When a mother and her 14-year-old son escaped from the building, the soldiers opened fire on both of them, according to a third survivor.
The boy died immediately, and the mother succumbed to her injuries two days later.
Human rights activist Williamson sees Russia as responsible for the crimes.
The country has an internationally binding responsibility to investigate the alleged crimes of its soldiers.
"Commanders should know that failure to act in the face of rape and murder makes them personally responsible for war crimes."
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