DISINFO: Bucha massacre was carried out by Ukrainian artillery
SUMMARY
... [H]ow did the investigation of the tragedy in Bucha end[?] A year has passed. The West continues to lie. [...] it was the French police and also British forensic experts were involved [in the investigation]. They reported that most of the bodies that were submitted for examination died from the use of artillery. That these are not shootings. At the same time, they coquettishly did not say whose artillery. Although it is obvious that it was Ukrainian artillery, according to the submunitions that were found.
RESPONSE
Recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation denying the involvement of Russian troops in a massacre in the town of Bucha near Kyiv. This is part of a disinformation campaign aiming to justify Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine.
Dozens of Bucha civilians were killed by metal shrapnels from Russian artillery. “We are seeing a lot mutilated (disfigured) bodies,” , - Vladyslav Pirovskyi, a Ukrainian forensic doctor, told the Guardian in April 2022. “A lot of them had their hands tied behind their backs and shots in the back of their heads. There were also cases with automatic gunfire, like six to eight holes on the back of victims. And we have several cases of cluster bombs’ elements embedded in the bodies of the victims.” The use of such indiscriminate weapons in areas with civilians is a violation of humanitarian law.
The New York Times has identified 36 of the victims along Yablunska Street. A Russian military unit killed dozens in Bucha, a Times investigation shows. But an eight-month visual investigation by The New York Times concluded that the perpetrators of the massacre along Yablunska Street were Russian paratroopers from the 234th Air Assault Regiment led by Lt. Col. Artyom Gorodilov.
Evidence includes photos and videos by Bucha survivors, CCTV footage, satellite footage, and details of calls to Russia made by perpetrators from the phones of murdered victims.
Universal jurisdiction investigations of war crimes in Ukraine are investigations of war crimes in the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine carried out under the legal systems of individual states under the universal jurisdiction principle of international humanitarian law. States that started investigations include Germany, Lithuania, Spain and Sweden and others.
Following the atrocities in Bucha, in Ukraine, President von der Leyen tasked Commissioner for Justice, Didier Reynders, to follow-up and support the coordination of the EU efforts to investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Ukraine. A Joint Investigation Team has been set up with the support of Eurojust to collect evidence and investigate core international crimes committed in Ukraine. The Joint Investigation Team consists of the International Criminal Court, Ukraine, and Lithuania, Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Slovakia, Romania. Read more here.
See more disinformation cases on Bucha.