Chernihiv, Ukraine (AP)-Ukrainian leaders predicted more horrific discoveries in reclaimed towns and cities as Russian troops retreated to focus on eastern Ukraine, officials said anticipating Russia’s missile attack on a busy train loaded with civilians. . People Friday.
Hours after warning that Ukrainian forces had already found the worst scene of violence in a crowded area north of Kiev, President Volodymyr Zelensky said “thousands” of people were at the Kramatorsk station, east of Donetsk, in the city when it hit. Rocket.
Zelensky’s post on social media was accompanied by photos showing the train carriage with cracked windows, abandoned luggage, and bodies that looked like a waiting area outside. Authorities said more than 100 people were injured in the attack.
“The inhumane Russians do not change their methods.” They remain on the battlefield without strength and courage, they are destroying the civilian population, “the president said.” This evil is boundless. And if he will not be punished, he will not stop ”.
After the collapse of the Ukrainian capital, Russia shifted its focus to the Donbas, a predominantly Russian-speaking industrial region in eastern Ukraine, where Moscow-backed rebels have been fighting Ukrainian forces for eight years. and controls certain areas.
Ukrainian officials this week warned residents to leave safe parts of the country as soon as possible, saying they and Russia have agreed to create more evacuation routes to the east. Kramatorsk is located in a government -controlled area.
In his nightly video speech, Zelensky predicted that more frightening discoveries would take place in northern cities and towns left by the Russians out of concentration in eastern Ukraine. He said evidence of civilians being killed at close range in the streets of Bucha and thrown into the streets had already emerged in Borodianka, another community outside the capital.
“And what will happen when the world finds out the whole truth about what the Russian troops did in Mariupol?” Zelensky said on Thursday that he was referring to the besieged southern port, which has suffered the most since Russia invaded Ukraine. “Every street is what the world has seen since the departure of Russian troops from Bucha and other cities in the Kiev region. The same brutality. The same horrific crimes.”
After the Ukrainian foreign minister, NATO countries decided to increase arms supplies, claiming that Russian forces had committed atrocities around the capital. He demanded guns From the Alliance and other countries in solidarity to help fight the impending attack in the East.
Bucha mayor Anatoly Fedoruk said investigators found at least three locations where the shootings took place during the Russian occupation. Most of the victims died from the shooting, not the bombing, he said, and some of the bodies were handcuffed “thrown for fuel” in mass graves, including at a children’s camp.
Fedoruk said the death toll rose to 320 civilians on Wednesday, but he expected more because the bodies were found in a city where 50,000 people live. There are only 3,700 left.
In his speech that evening, Zelensky said Bucha’s fears may be just the beginning. In the northern town of Borodyanka, just 30 kilometers (20 miles) northwest of Bucha, he warned of further casualties, saying “there’s a lot of horror there.”
Ukrainians and some Western leaders blamed Moscow troops for the massacre. The weekly Der Spiegel reports that the German Foreign Intelligence Agency listened to radio messages to Russian soldiers discussing the killing of civilians. Russia falsely claims that The scenes were staged in Bucha.
A Kremlin spokesman said on Thursday that Russia had suffered heavy casualties during its six -week military operation in Ukraine.
“Yes, we had a huge troop defeat and it was a huge tragedy for us,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Sky News.
Peskov also hinted that the fighting could end in the “debated future” and told Sky that Russian troops were “doing everything possible to end the operation”.
On Thursday, a day after Russian forces began bombing their village in the southern region of Mykolaiv, 52-year-old Sergei Dubovienko headed north carrying his blue ladle to Bastanka with his wife and mother-in-law, where they are looking. shelter in a church.
They started demolishing houses and everything in Pavlo-Marianovka, he said. “Then the tanks appeared from the forest. We thought there was another bombing in the morning, so I decided to leave.”
Hundreds of people fled from villages in the Mykolaiv and Kherson regions, which were attacked or occupied by Russian forces.
Marina Morozova and her husband fled to Cherson, the first major city given to the Russians.
“They were expecting a good fight. We saw the bullets not pass. It was horrible,” he said.
Morozova, 69, said only Russian television and radio were available. The Russians distributed humanitarian aid, he said, and shot the distribution.
Wanting to escape the Russian troops, the couple and the others boarded a van that would take them west. Some will try to leave the country, while others will remain in the quiet part of Ukraine.
The United Nations estimates that the war has displaced at least 6.5 million people in the country.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) says more than 4.3 million people, half of them children, have fled Ukraine since Russia invaded on February 24 and caused Europe’s biggest refugee crisis since World War II.
The International Organization for Migration estimates that more than 12 million people are trapped in the areas under attack in Ukraine.
On Thursday, the UN humanitarian chief told The Associated Press that he was “Not optimistic” about the ceasefire After meeting with officials in Kiev and Moscow this week, he noted the lack of trust between the parties. He spoke hours after Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused Ukraine of withdrawing from its proposals in Crimea and Ukraine’s military status.
Two senior EU officials and the Slovakian prime minister left for Kiev on Friday to strengthen EU support for Ukraine. Prime Minister Edward Heger said he, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell had proposals for trade and humanitarian aid for Zelensky and his government.
Part of it, Heger said, is “offering transportation options for wheat, including wheat.” Ukraine is a major supplier of wheat in the world and Russia’s war with Ukraine is creating a deficit, especially in the Middle East.
Western countries Sanctions have been tightened, And a group of seven major world powers have warned they will continue to act until Russian troops leave Ukraine.
US President Joe Biden said the UN vote showed how “Putin’s war turned Russia into an international party”. He called the images from Bucha “horrible”.
“The signs of rape, torture and murder – in some cases, the abuse of their bodies – are the wrath of our common humanity,” Biden said.
Reported by Shrek from Kiev, Ukraine. Associated Press reporters from around the world contributed to this report.
Source: Huffpost
