Surrounded by Russian forces, the five Ukrainian soldiers surrendered. On a video posted on the network Telegram and dated December 22, they are seen coming out of a building, not far from Volnovakha, a town in the Donetsk region (east). Two of them collapsed, visibly killed on the spot; the other three seem to be shot down a little further away.
Almost the same scene on October 1, about a hundred kilometers to the north, near Pokrovsk. The images show sixteen fighters coming out of a wooded area after their surrender. They line up, then fall. The wounded, who showed signs of life, were killed at point blank range by a burst of automatic rifle
says the Ukrainian prosecutor's office, which has opened an investigation. For Prosecutor General Andriï Kostine, this is the most massive known case of execution of prisoners of war on the front line
.
Held as a hero by the Ukrainians, who erected a memorial to him, Oleksandr Matsievsky was the first documented case, in March 2023. A video showed him with a cigarette on his lips, in a forest where he had just been forced to dig his own grave.
A suspicious explosion in a prison
Beheadings, shootings point blank
on soldiers hands tied behind the back
… Since the start of the invasion in February 2022, the execution of 177 prisoners of war has been documented by Dmytro Lubinets, the Ukrainian parliamentary commissioner for human rights. The situation has deteriorated considerably [avec] 109 cases for the year 2024 alone
he recorded in mid-December, in an interview with the information site Ukrainian Truth.
Since taken up by observers from the United Nations and the European Union, these figures do not include the approximately 45 Ukrainian soldiers killed during an explosion in the Olenivka prison (Donetsk) occupied by Russian troops, during the night from July 28 to 29. According to KHPG, one of the main human rights organizations in Ukraine, witnesses assure that it was not an accident. NGOs have appealed to the International Criminal Court in The Hague to deliberate mass murder
.
War crimes
For other alleged executions, around fifty investigations are underway in Ukraine. If proven, these are war crimes, according to the Geneva Convention, which stipulates that combatants taken prisoner after being arrested or surrendered must be treated with humanity
.
Murders and torture [de ces détenus] are not an accident but a deliberate policy, supports prosecutor Kostine. Instructions have been issued.
On November 18, Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) said it intercepted a telephone communication during which a Russian commander ordered his subordinates to kill a prisoner of war.
Nothing surprising for the Institute for the Study of War (ISW). As early as October, the American organization, confirming an increase in executions, reported evidence that Russian commanders tolerate them, encourage them or directly order them.”
The Kremlin has made no denial. But last February, according to the Russian agency Tass, Vladimir Putin had ordered his Defense Minister to ensure that his troops act in strict compliance with international conventions
in treating prisoners of war with dignity
.
The Russian president also pointed out, without further details, summary executions on the Ukrainian side. At the beginning of October, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UCDH) revealed that it had interviewed 205 Russian prisoners, between March 2023 and August 2024: 104 of them claimed to have suffered acts of torture or ill-treatment
. But for the UN, there is nothing to prove that orders were given to this effect. HAS rare exceptions
these behaviors stopped as soon as the prisoners arrived at official places of internment
. According to investigators, they were then treated properly.
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