RUSSIA’S P.O.W. ‘KILL ORDER’
Troop audio reveals ‘war crime’
Russian troops in eastern Ukraine were ordered to kill prisoners of war — with chilling directions to make sure no one ever “sees them again,” according to audio obtained by Ukrainian intelligence this week.
“What the f--k can I tell you?” one soldier says to his comrade, according to a translation published by The Times of London.
The first soldier then suggests that the eldest captive can live, but instructs the other: “Let the rest of them go forever.”
The second soldier replies, “F--king let them go forever! No one ever f--king sees them again, including their families.”
The audio, which has not been independently verified, was shared on the Telegram channel for the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense’s Intelligence Directorate. It is alleged to be a communication intercept between Russian soldiers near the town of Popasna in the Donbas region, discussing what to do with captured Ukrainian servicemen.
“This is a blatant war crime, a violation of international law, and another striking example that the Russian army is murderers, rapists and looters, and by no means military,” the directorate said in its post.
Donbas taken
It is unclear when the audio was taken, but Russian forces are currently threatening to overrun Popasna in the Kremlin’s renewed drive for the Donbas — Ukraine’s industrial heartland.
Serhiy Haidai, governor of the Luhansk Oblast, said Friday that Russia controlled some 80% of the Donbas, which is made up of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.
As the fighting for the east continues, Ukraine seems to be gaining an edge in military equipment. The embattled nation is currently fielding more tanks than its superpower adversary, a senior Pentagon official told The Washington Post.
The Pentagon has said it expects this phase of the war to favor the use of artillery and armor.
The Biden administration announced Thursday that the US is sending another $800 million in military aid to Ukraine to assist as it defends against the Russian offensive in the east.
The package is expected to include 72 155-millimeter Howitzers, 72 vehicles to tow the Howitzers and 144,000 artillery rounds. More than 121 tactical drones will also be sent to Ukraine.
Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said Friday that Russia had moved additional troops into the Donbas over the past 24 hours, while continuing to bomb Mariupol from the air — just a day after Putin claimed his forces had already taken the town.
“It’s clear to us that he wants to focus on the east and the south,” Kirby said of the war’s second phase. “We don’t anticipate that it’s going to be over in days or even in coming weeks. We think it potentially could go longer than that,” he added.
Ukrainian Defense Secretary Oleksiy Danilov said Friday that Russia had 100,000 troops currently in Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Danilov said, a latenight helicopter delivery had already brought weaponry and supplies to Ukrainian defenders of Mariupol, holed up in a steel mill and blockaded by Russian troops.
Earlier, satellite photos of mass graves shared by Ukrainian media seem to depict an eerily similar scene to the burial sites found outside Kyiv earlier this month. The images could not immediately be verified.
As many as 9,000 Ukraine civilians could have been executed by Russian forces and buried in mass graves outside Mariupol, according to Mayor Vadym Boychenko.