Ukraine update: 'The Russians have turned our whole city into a death camp'
Mark Sumner
A makeshift cross marks the site where four bodies were buried together in Bucha.
The atrocities in Bucha were only uncovered after Russian forces withdrew rapidly under fire from advancing Ukrainian troops. Now, as Ukrainian forces go town to town across northern Ukraine, more horrors are being discovered. Survivors are telling stories of civilians gunned down without warning, of homes set on fire for no reason, and of people being taken from their homes and executed, apparently for the amusement of the occupiers.
In Borodyanka an apartment building above a shelter holding hundreds of people was blasted into ruins, and despite being told of the situation, it appears Russian forces made no effort to remove the rubble that they had generated. Ukrainian workers are clearing the wreckage now, all too aware of what they are likely to find. The destruction in the town, 20 miles northwest of Kyiv, is considered the worst seen anywhere so far
Of course, the world hasn’t seen everything. In Mariupol—where Russian forces deliberately bombed an opera house labeled with the word “children” and where thousands have been taken away to unknown locations inside Russia—weeks of shelling are now being followed with weeks of fighting street by street, while over 100,000 people remain trapped inside the tightening circle. With limited communications, Mariupol isn’t producing the steady stream of images seen early in the invasion. What’s happening in the city, especially in the sections now occupied by Russia, is impossible to say.
But there are horrible clues …
Even before the tanks rolled across the Ukraine border, there were reports of these crematory units being seen on the ground with Russian forces. The assumption was that they were to be used to incinerate the bodies of Russian soldiers lost in battle, disguising the extent of their own losses. Similar units were reportedly seen following fighting in the Donbas region in 2014 and 2015. At the time, Ukrainian officials reported that multiple such mobile crematoria were being used to incinerate dozens of bodies per day.
Based on what’s been seen of the cruelty of forces involved in this invasion, it’s very easy to believe the claims coming from Mariupol. However, it is not possible at this point to know if there is any truth behind these reports. But the mayor of the besieged city put it in the starkest terms imaginable.
“The scale of the tragedy in Mariupol is something the world has not seen since the time of Nazi concentration camps,” said the mayor. “The Russians have turned our whole city into a death camp.”
......
From the first day of the war, Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy made it clear that Ukraine was ready to surrender the idea of joining NATO as part of a peace agreement with Russia. Instead, Zelenskyy proposed that Ukraine make a separate agreement with several other countries that would promise to offer assistance in case Ukraine was attacked. That would allow Ukraine to meet Russian demands that it not join NATO, but wouldn’t leave the nation standing on its own in case Russia decided to come back for another bite.
At the first two meetings between Russian negotiators and Ukrainian representatives in Belarus, Russia seemed to be accepting of this idea. But at the talks in Istanbul, Russian demands appeared to be that Ukraine strip itself of weapons, not join NATO, and not be allowed to be a part of any security pact. Essentially, that Ukraine stand helpless against any future attack. Which was not exactly the right demand to make when Russian forces in Ukraine were losing.
Since that point, Zelenskyy has seems to have put the idea of Ukraine joining NATO squarely back onto the table. However, it seems he’s still negotiating an alternative.
In light of the discoveries in Bucha and elsewhere, it’s become clear that even if civilians are not killed outright by a Russian military that has deliberately targeted hospitals, homes, schools, and shelters, what happens to civilians when a village or town is occupied by Russian forces can be even worse. So it’s understandable that Ukrainian officials are working desperately in an effort to evacuate civilians who remain in Kharkiv, Donetsk, and Luhansk oblasts. These are the areas where the most intense fighting is expected to occur in the near future, and where Russian forces are advancing to occupy new locations.
Both special trains and busses are now engaged in a full time effort to shuffle people from these oblasts to Kyiv and points west.
.........
We can only hope that those Russian soldiers who were involved in Bucha were also the ones given this assignment.
Mark Sumner
A makeshift cross marks the site where four bodies were buried together in Bucha.
The atrocities in Bucha were only uncovered after Russian forces withdrew rapidly under fire from advancing Ukrainian troops. Now, as Ukrainian forces go town to town across northern Ukraine, more horrors are being discovered. Survivors are telling stories of civilians gunned down without warning, of homes set on fire for no reason, and of people being taken from their homes and executed, apparently for the amusement of the occupiers.
In Borodyanka an apartment building above a shelter holding hundreds of people was blasted into ruins, and despite being told of the situation, it appears Russian forces made no effort to remove the rubble that they had generated. Ukrainian workers are clearing the wreckage now, all too aware of what they are likely to find. The destruction in the town, 20 miles northwest of Kyiv, is considered the worst seen anywhere so far
Of course, the world hasn’t seen everything. In Mariupol—where Russian forces deliberately bombed an opera house labeled with the word “children” and where thousands have been taken away to unknown locations inside Russia—weeks of shelling are now being followed with weeks of fighting street by street, while over 100,000 people remain trapped inside the tightening circle. With limited communications, Mariupol isn’t producing the steady stream of images seen early in the invasion. What’s happening in the city, especially in the sections now occupied by Russia, is impossible to say.
But there are horrible clues …
Even before the tanks rolled across the Ukraine border, there were reports of these crematory units being seen on the ground with Russian forces. The assumption was that they were to be used to incinerate the bodies of Russian soldiers lost in battle, disguising the extent of their own losses. Similar units were reportedly seen following fighting in the Donbas region in 2014 and 2015. At the time, Ukrainian officials reported that multiple such mobile crematoria were being used to incinerate dozens of bodies per day.
Based on what’s been seen of the cruelty of forces involved in this invasion, it’s very easy to believe the claims coming from Mariupol. However, it is not possible at this point to know if there is any truth behind these reports. But the mayor of the besieged city put it in the starkest terms imaginable.
“The scale of the tragedy in Mariupol is something the world has not seen since the time of Nazi concentration camps,” said the mayor. “The Russians have turned our whole city into a death camp.”
......
From the first day of the war, Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy made it clear that Ukraine was ready to surrender the idea of joining NATO as part of a peace agreement with Russia. Instead, Zelenskyy proposed that Ukraine make a separate agreement with several other countries that would promise to offer assistance in case Ukraine was attacked. That would allow Ukraine to meet Russian demands that it not join NATO, but wouldn’t leave the nation standing on its own in case Russia decided to come back for another bite.
At the first two meetings between Russian negotiators and Ukrainian representatives in Belarus, Russia seemed to be accepting of this idea. But at the talks in Istanbul, Russian demands appeared to be that Ukraine strip itself of weapons, not join NATO, and not be allowed to be a part of any security pact. Essentially, that Ukraine stand helpless against any future attack. Which was not exactly the right demand to make when Russian forces in Ukraine were losing.
Since that point, Zelenskyy has seems to have put the idea of Ukraine joining NATO squarely back onto the table. However, it seems he’s still negotiating an alternative.
In light of the discoveries in Bucha and elsewhere, it’s become clear that even if civilians are not killed outright by a Russian military that has deliberately targeted hospitals, homes, schools, and shelters, what happens to civilians when a village or town is occupied by Russian forces can be even worse. So it’s understandable that Ukrainian officials are working desperately in an effort to evacuate civilians who remain in Kharkiv, Donetsk, and Luhansk oblasts. These are the areas where the most intense fighting is expected to occur in the near future, and where Russian forces are advancing to occupy new locations.
Both special trains and busses are now engaged in a full time effort to shuffle people from these oblasts to Kyiv and points west.
.........
We can only hope that those Russian soldiers who were involved in Bucha were also the ones given this assignment.
