Russian forces execute 16 Ukrainian POWs on Pokrovsk front

Police officers started looking into the purported shooting of 16 Ukrainian prisoners of war by Russian forces on the Pokrovsk front.

The Prosecutor General's Office reported that.

On October 1, information appeared on Telegram channels about the alleged shooting of 16 Ukrainian service members by representatives of the Russian army. According to the media, another war crime was committed by the Russian occupying army in the area of ​​Mykolaivka and Sukhyi Yar villages of Pokrovsky district.

The video that was released depicts the captured soldiers of Ukraine's armed forces leaving the plantation under enemy control. Once they were lined up, the Russian occupiers purposefully fired on them, aiming to defeat them. The injured soldiers who were still alive were then brutally killed at close range with automatic weapons.

The Prosecutor General's Office stated that such actions are a cynical and gross violation of the Geneva Conventions and qualify as a grave international crime.

Prosecutor General Andrii Kostin emphasized that this is the most massive known case of execution of Ukrainian prisoners of war on the front line.

The law enforcement officers have started a pre-trial investigation for violation of the laws and customs of war, combined with intentional murder – Part 2 of Art. 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.

Dmytro Lubinets, the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights, wrote letters to the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross based on all the facts of the alleged murders of Ukrainian prisoners of war.

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It is essential to mention that Yurii Belousov, the head of the Department of the Prosecutor General's Office for Countering Crimes Committed in Conditions of Armed Conflict, stated that between March 2022 and April 2024, 54 instances of Ukrainian prisoners of war being executed by Russian occupiers have been reported.

It was revealed on September 6 that the Russian military had killed a Ukrainian prisoner of war and shared a video of the execution.

In addition, in mid-August, a video appeared on the Internet in which the Russians showed the severed head of an alleged Ukrainian serviceman. It happened at the Kolotilovka checkpoint in the Belgorod region of Russia.

Regarding the video of the execution of Ukrainian prisoners, which appeared on social networks on April 7, Belousov said that the crime scene near Krynky in the Kherson region was previously confirmed, but the details are still being checked.

Also, on February 18, service members of the Russian Federation shot two Ukrainian prisoners of war in the area of ​​responsibility of the Khortytsia Operational and Strategic Group of Forces.

On February 20, a video of the execution of three captured Ukrainian defenders by the military of the Russian army near the village of Robotyne, Zaporizhzhia region, went viral.

In addition, in the Bakhmut area, the Russian occupiers shot Ukrainian soldiers who surrendered as prisoners. The crime of the occupiers became known, in particular, from a video that spread on social networks. According to the ombudsman, this probably happened on February 24, 2024, on the Bakhmut front.