Kyiv accuses Moscow of executing two Ukrainian prisoners of war

As the Russian army continues its offensive near Avdiivka, the Ukrainian army accuses Russia of shooting two of its prisoners in the east of the country. The authenticity of the video, which is difficult to verify, has not yet been confirmed by kyiv.

Kyiv once again accuses Moscow of violating humanitarian law. On Sunday, February 18, the Ukrainian army claimed that Russia shot two Ukrainian prisoners of war in the east of the country. “The Russians have once again shown their attitude towards international humanitarian law by shooting two Ukrainian prisoners of war,” the country’s ground forces said on Telegram. They have released a short black and white video recorded from a drone, the authenticity of which is difficult to confirm and in which you can see a soldier shooting two soldiers who are very close to him in the same trench and do not put up any resistance. Without mentioning where this incident took place, the Ukrainian army only indicates that it was in the area of ​​”Khortytsia”.

The area is made up of Kharkiv, Lugansk and part of Donetsk, but not the city of Avdiivka, which the Russian army took control of the day before after months of heavy fighting. If this incident of killing prisoners is confirmed, this will be another violation of Article 3 of the Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners of war, which determines that killing a soldier who has surrendered is a war crime, reports our correspondent in Kiev, Emmanuelle Chaze. Early on Saturday after the announcement of the fall of the town of Avdiïvka to the Russian army, pictures circulated online showing other Ukrainian soldiers lying on the ground, their hands tied, also apparently killed, while Oleksandr Tarnavskiy, the commander of the operation in the east country, confirms that several of them were arrested when the Ukrainian soldiers had surrendered.

The DeepState Telegram channel, which is close to the Ukrainian military, also claimed earlier in the day that the Russian army had shot and killed six Ukrainian soldiers, including two wounded, in an area south of Avdika, possibly on Thursday. The Ukrainian authorities have so far not commented on these allegations. Moscow and Kyiv have already been accused several times of killing prisoners of war since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In March 2023, a video showing a captured Ukrainian soldier being shot dead after saying “glory to Ukraine”, went viral. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights of the United Nations recalled at the time that it “documented numerous violations of international humanitarian law against prisoners of war, including the brutal killing of surrendered prisoners in the hands of authorities on the part of Russia and Ukraine.