Russia slams international orgs for silence over Ukraine POW execution
Russia denounced international organizations over their silence on Kiev's forces executing prisoners of war.
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A Ukrainian soldier looks on in his position in the frontline close to Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Thursday, Feb. 9, 2023 (AP Photo/Libkos)
The Ukrainian armed forces executed in a video that was circulated on social media on Wednesday a Russian prisoner of war, with further reports suggesting that a second was executed off camera.
More Z POW mercing by UA. I pixelated.
— Ghost (@mdfzeh) February 8, 2023
Uncensored on TG or you probably will see it spammed by edgy nafoids in some comment section. pic.twitter.com/xtqVXOym7s
The execution of Russian prisoners of war is down to Ukraine's Western patrons and the silence of international organizations is shameful, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Thursday.
According to the ministry, Moscow repeatedly attracted the attention of the international community and relevant organizations to the war crimes being committed by Kiev's forces, stressing that the Ukrainian authorities had not observed international humanitarian law.
"The next execution of Russian prisoners of war is largely down to the Western patrons of Kiev," the ministry said in a statement.
The West silencing such crimes is making all killings of the sorts possible, Moscow added.
"A shameful fact is the silence of relevant international organizations that have traded professionalism and objectivity for the desire to curry favor with the United States and other Western countries," the statement said.
The ministry noted that Russia's Investigative Committee had already said it began investigating new video evidence of Kiev's forces committing war crimes, emphasizing that they would not go unpunished.
Kiev's forces have long been facing accusations from Moscow of committing war crimes against Russian and allied troops, including the execution and torture of prisoners of war.
Russian Commissioner for Human Rights, Ombudswoman Tatiana Moskalkova, urged in January her Ukrainian counterpart, the United Nations, and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) to demand that Ukraine stop using torture against prisoners of war.
"I urge the Ukrainian Parliament Commissioner for Human Rights, the UN Committee against Torture, the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the International Committee of the Red Cross to demand that the Ukrainian side immediately comply with the Geneva Convention of 1949, which prohibits torture, violence and acts degrading to human dignity," Moskalkova said.
The ombudswoman revealed that the relatives of captured Russian troops had received footage showing violence being carried out against the prisoners and threats that the captives would be killed if the people behind the camera do not receive a ransom.
Furthermore, she said she was drafting an appeal to the Russian Investigative Committee chief Alexander Bastrykin on such cases, expressing hope that the captured soldiers would be released.
This came after the ombudsman of the DPR revealed that Ukrainian soldiers called the relatives of POWs to demand ransom in exchange for their family members.
In March 2022, a Ukrainian doctor and head of the Mobile Hospital project in Ukraine's army, Gennady Druzenko, called on doctors under his command to castrate Russian prisoners during an interview with channel Ukraine 24.
During the same month, graphic footage emerged of Ukrainian soldiers shooting Russians at point-blank range.
In one incident, a video of a Russian soldier being shot in the legs surfaced on the Internet, prompting Russian officials to condemn the incident.
In April, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Oleg Syromolotov told Sputnik that the Ukrainian military is instilling fear in people by showing footage of Russian POWs being tortured.
"One of the means of psychological pressure used by terrorists to achieve their goals is to instill a climate of fear… For this purpose, militants of nationalist units torment Russian prisoners of war by recording torture videos and disseminating these horrifying footage," Syromolotov said.
Russia sent investigators to Kherson back in May to launch a probe into alleged cases of torture in the region perpetrated by Ukrainian militants.
Moreover, two eyewitnesses reported to Sputnik in October that Ukrainian security forces have electrocuted, starved, and beaten Russian prisoners of war with hammers.
