The bodies of at least 20 civilian men have been found lying strewn across the street in the town of Bucha, northwest of Kyiv following the withdrawal of Russian forces from the area in shocking images released by AFP on Saturday.
The dead, all in civilian clothing, are found in a variety of awkward poses, some face down against the pavement, others facing upwards with mouths open.
“Three of them are tangled up in bicycles after taking their final ride, while others, with waxy skin, have fallen next to bullet-ridden and crushed cars,” according to AFP journalists who accessed the town after it had been cut off for nearly a month.
One corpse can be seen with his hands tied behind his back with a white cloth.
The Mayor of Bucha, Anatoliy Fedoruk, said the dead civilians had received inhumane treatment at the hands of Russian forces.
Ukrainian presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said the bodies of the men found with hands tied, “were shot dead by Russian soldiers,” in a tweet on Saturday. Podolyak added, “these people were not in the military.
They had no weapons. They posed no threat. How many more such cases are happening right now in the occupied territories?”CNN has not been able to independently confirm the details around the men’s deaths.
Russian forces withdrew from several towns near Kyiv in recent days after Moscow’s bid to encircle the capital failed, with Ukraine declaring that Bucha had been “liberated.”
CNN
