War in Ukraine: The UN confirms the murder of at least 50 civilians in Bucha | International

The UN has documented the murder of 50 civilians in the Ukrainian city of Bucha (about 35,000 inhabitants, before the war). As announced this Friday in Geneva by the spokeswoman for the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ravina Shamdasani, during a mission on April 9 in this town near kyiv, the homicide investigators of the UN commission collected evidence with which they have been able to corroborate, for the time being, the murders, including summary executions, of at least fifty civilians.

Shamdasani has pointed out that the High Commissioner notes growing evidence of war crimes in Ukraine, in which “the Russian armed forces have indiscriminately bombed populated areas, killed civilians and destroyed hospitals and schools”, in addition to other non-military infrastructure.

On March 29, when the Russian troops left Bucha, the bodies of dozens of dead civilians, apparently murdered, began to appear in its streets, whose photographs shocked the world. The Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky, then accused Russia of “war crimes”, both in Bucha and in other towns in the country.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, has highlighted in a statement the violation of international law eight weeks after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. “International humanitarian law has not only been ignored, but totally abandoned,” said the former president of Chile. “Almost every Bucha resident these experts spoke to reported the death of one of their relatives, neighbors or other people,” he stressed.

In the text, Bachelet has also pointed out that the Russian attack on April 8 against the Kramatorsk train station, the capital of Donbas, which caused the death of 60 civilians and injured 111 others, symbolizes the lack of respect for international laws. that prohibit indiscriminate military action. In addition, he has asked to preserve the evidence of these crimes in the face of possible legal proceedings, to treat the mortal remains of these massacres in a dignified manner and to provide psychological help to the families of the victims and the survivors.

The UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine has documented the deaths of at least 2,345 civilians and 2,919 injuries during the war. The reports register 114 attacks on medical facilities, and according to the high commissioner, her experts estimate that at least 3,000 civilians died due to lack of access to health care. Bachelet has stressed that the real number of victims of the conflict “could increase much more when the horrors come to light in areas of intense confrontation, such as Mariúpol”.

Additionally, the body has received 75 complaints of sexual violence against women, men and minors by Russian soldiers, especially in the kyiv region. Other abuses collected by these experts include the arbitrary arrests of civilians by Russian or pro-Russian forces, with more than 155 complaints in this regard, including arrests of local leaders, journalists, activists and human rights defenders.

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