Kyiv mayor says Russian attacks in Bucha are ‘genocide’

By AP 3 April 2022, 1:11 pm

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Bodies lie on a street in Bucha, northwest of Kyiv, as Ukraine says Russian forces are making a 'rapid retreat' from northern areas around Kyiv and the city of Chernihiv, on April 2, 2022. (Ronaldo Schemidt/AFP)

The mayor of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, expresses shock at what he calls “cruel war crimes” committed by Russian soldiers in the town of Bucha northwest of the capital.

Referring to reports of executed civilians, Klitschko tells German daily Bild that “what happened in Bucha and other suburbs of Kyiv can only be described as genocide.”

An AP crew today saw the bodies of at least nine people who appear to have been executed. At least two of them had their hands tied behind their backs. They were all in civilian clothes and at least three were naked from the waist up. One appeared shot in the chest from close range.

Klitschko says Russian President Vladimir Putin is responsible for these “cruel war crimes,” adding that civilians have been “shot with tied hands.”

He calls on the the whole world and especially Germany to immediately end gas imports from Russia.

He says that “especially for Germany, there can only be one consequence: Not a penny should go to Russia anymore, that’s bloody money used to slaughter people. The gas and oil embargo must come immediately.”