Liberated areas near Izyum: Hundreds of graves and torture rooms

Horror pictures in the liberated areas near Izyum: According to Ukrainian information, many victims died as a result of Russian attacks, some starved to death, and some were tortured. The UN calls the finds shocking.

Hundreds of graves and several “torture rooms” have been discovered in the Kharkiv region, which was recaptured by Ukrainian troops. A total of 443 graves were found near Izyum. According to Ukrainian sources, the bodies are mostly civilians.

The AFP news agency, citing Ukrainian authorities, also reports a grave with 17 soldiers. Eyewitnesses report another find – around 200 wooden crosses were discovered near a cemetery.

Ukrainian authorities began exhuming the bodies today.

traces of torture

The graves were dug during the battles over Russia’s capture of Izyum in March and during the Russian occupation, said Oleg Kotenko, Ukraine’s government commissioner for missing people. Some people died of hunger. “This part of the city was cut off, there were no supply options,” said Kotenko.

According to the head of the Kharkiv prosecutor’s office, Oleksandr Filchakov, some of the exhumed bodies show signs of torture. Some were found with their hands tied behind their backs and ropes around their necks. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the site is an example of “where the Russian occupation has led”.

Police chief reports of torture chambers

Ukrainian police chief Ihor Klymenko accused Russian soldiers of committing war crimes on a large scale in the Kharkov region: “To date we have found at least ten torture chambers in various settlements.” Two of them are in the town of Balaklija, one of them on the premises of the local police station: “It was a semi-basement, a single cell. There were about 40 people in the cells.”

Since last week, more than 200 criminal proceedings have been initiated against Russian soldiers for war crimes.

Russia is silent on the allegations

“For months, terror, violence, torture and mass murders reigned in the occupied territories,” Zelenskyi adviser Mykhailo Podoliak tweeted at photos of a forest dotted with wooden crosses in fresh muddy ground. “Does anyone else want to ‘freeze the war’ instead of sending tanks? We have no right to leave people alone with evil,” wrote Podoliak.

UN wants to send observers, Russia is silent

The United Nations Human Rights Office announced that it would send observers to Izyum. “They want to go there to find out more about what may have happened,” spokeswoman Liz Throssell said. She called the finds shocking. When such a visit could take place is still unclear.

Russia has not yet commented on the allegations. In the past, the Kremlin has denied that its troops commit atrocities or target civilians.

Stoltenberg: “It’s not the beginning of the end yet”

Meanwhile, after a week of rapid advances in the northeast, Ukrainian officials dampened expectations that their troops could continue advancing at this pace. Russian troops who fled the Kharkiv region are said to be entrenched and planning to defend areas in neighboring Luhansk and Donetsk provinces.

“It is of course extremely encouraging to see that Ukrainian forces were able to retake territory and also push behind Russian lines,” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told the BBC. “At the same time, we have to understand that this is not the beginning of the end of the war. We have to be prepared for a long period of time.”

The Ukrainian army, on the other hand, is now massively attacking the southern region of Cherson. According to spokeswoman Natalia Humenyuk, the troops have carried out hundreds of attacks against Russian units in the past few hours. According to Humenyuk, almost the entire Kherson region is under Ukrainian fire. Although this information cannot currently be verified independently, Ukrainian attacks on Kherson have been confirmed by the pro-Russian administration deployed there.