Kiev accused Russia on Saturday of committing a “war crime” by executing Ukrainian soldiers who had signaled their intention to surrender after images circulated on social networks whose authenticity was unclear. AFP was unable to verify this.
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A short video posted on Telegram shows two men emerging from a bunker, one with his hands over his head, before lying on the ground as another group of soldiers watched.
Gunfire occurs and smoke appears before the video abruptly ends.
These undated images were portrayed on social media as being taken near Avdiivka, a city in eastern Ukraine where fighting is raging. But neither their location nor their authenticity could be confirmed by AFP.
The Ukrainian human rights commissioner Dmytro Loubinets, however, denounced a “war crime”.
“Today a video of the execution of surrendered Ukrainian soldiers by Russian soldiers was published on the Internet,” he wrote on Telegram.
Dmytro Loubinets estimated that the Ukrainian soldiers “did what was necessary by showing that they had surrendered” and that Russia had “captured” them, and demanded appropriate “punishment.”
The two men “posed no threat,” he added.
In March, another video went viral showing a captured Ukrainian soldier being executed by gunfire after saying “Glory to Ukraine.”
The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights recalled at the time that it had “documented numerous violations of international humanitarian law against prisoners of war, including cases of summary executions of prisoners of war in Russia and Ukraine.”