Ukraine war
“They shot everyone they saw”: Eyewitnesses describe the Bucha massacre
Ukraine, Bucha: A woman kisses a man while cooking on an open fire in front of an apartment building that has been without electricity, water and gas since the Russian invasion
© Vadim Ghirda / DPA
Several hundred civilians are said to have been shot dead by Russian soldiers in Bucha. Now the first eyewitnesses who experienced and survived the alleged war criminals are speaking up.
The images from Bucha, where soldiers apparently committed serious war crimes against Ukrainian civilians, shocked the western world. Now there are eyewitness reports from people who survived the massacre. Vladislav Kozlowsky tells the Belarusian TV channel “Belsat” how he had to witness how Russian soldiers shot residents in Bucha. Kozlowsky himself was beaten and tortured, but survived the withdrawal of Russian troops.
“On March 2, the occupying forces entered our city,” says the Ukrainian according to “Focus Online”. “Those who didn’t have guns were ordered to hide in an air raid shelter.” But the Russian troops discovered them and took him and others hostage. “There was no light, no water, no heat,” says Kozlowsky. At least the soldiers brought food.
“People shot dead because of tattooed Ukraine coat of arms”
Another unit came five days later. These Russian soldiers would have robbed the residents and checked the men’s documents. Anyone who took part in the Ukrainian military operation in Donbass or belonged to the army was shot immediately. The soldiers also checked tattoos and looked for “Nazis”. “Those who wore the coat of arms of Ukraine were also shot,” Kozlowsky said. The soldiers shot the men in the head or in the heart. Kozlowsky says he was only beaten himself: once in the bunker and later again at a friend’s house by a probably drunk Russian soldier.
Shortly before Bucha was liberated by the Ukrainian army, Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov’s notorious troops, the so-called Kadyrovites, spread terror and death: “Last week they ran through residential areas from the morning and shot everyone they saw. ” Kozlowsky’s neighbor was also killed by her: “He was retired, just sitting on a bench.” Two men tried to flee Bucha to Irpin: “Their bodies were found a few days later. My friend was shot in the back of the head. The other was tortured and his cheek was cut out.”
In the British newspaper The Guardian another resident describes the death of a civilian in Bucha. Taras Shevchenko, 43, told the newspaper: “There was a grandfather with his wife, they were going to cross a street when they were stopped by soldiers.” Because the old man gave cheeky answers, they simply shot him. The woman asked them to move on. “When she rushed to her husband and started crying, they said, ‘If you want to lie down with us, we can shoot you too.’ When she said she had to take her husband’s body with her, the soldiers told her to go on.”So she went on,” Shevchenko said. “She cried and went on.”
Man from Bucha shot in the head
Another eyewitness describes it in the “image” the death of her husband in Bucha: “It was March 5th. We were at home in our semi-detached house. Suddenly we heard an explosion: They destroyed half of our house. Then they started shooting through the windows. ‘Come out’, they shouted,” said 48-year-old Irina Abramova. Her husband Oleg then went out and said: “Don’t shoot! There are only civilians here.” They introduced themselves as Russians who had come to free them.
When her house caught fire, her husband tried to put out the fire. “At that moment they grabbed him, pulled off his sweater, pushed him to his knees and shot him in the head,” Abramova told the newspaper. Then she was interrogated and asked to say where the Nazis were. She asked the soldiers to kill her too. One of the soldiers aimed at her but said he would not kill women. She too is certain that the Chechen President’s fighters killed her husband. They didn’t look like Russians and didn’t speak with an accent. Her husband’s body lay where they shot him “until we were sure the soldiers had gone.”
Swell: “The Guardians”, “Focus Online”, “Bild.de”.