Boris Johnson condemns Russia’s ‘despicable attacks’ on Ukrainians in Bucha and Irpin 

Boris Johnson has condemned Russia’s ‘despicable attacks’ on Ukrainians living in Bucha and Irpin as images emerged of a van with ‘children’ written on it riddled with bullet holes and of dead civilians with their ‘hands tied behind their backs and shot in the head’.

The Prime Minister accused Vladimir Putin and his army of committing war crimes in Ukraine by carrying out ‘despicable attacks against innocent civilians’.

An adviser to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky earlier said dead civilians had been found on the streets of the small city of Bucha and the Kyiv suburb of Irpin, in what he said resembled a ‘horror movie’. 

The UK, France and Germany, along with the NATO Secretary General, on Sunday night called for an international probe to be opened into allegations of Russian ‘war crimes’.

On Sunday evening, Mr Johnson said the UK government was stepping up sanctions and military support, as well as providing additional support for those in need on the ground. 

His comments come as former heavyweight champion boxer Wladimir Klitschko visited Bucha to accuse Putin of ‘genocide’ after mass graves filled with civilian corpses were found after Russian troops left the Kyiv suburb.

Yesterday it was claimed that mass graves were discovered on the outskirts of Kyiv amid fears that brutal Russian troops are executing civilians as they retreated. 

The ex-boxer and brother to the mayor of Kyiv, Vitali Klitschko, took to Twitter to accuse the Russian regime of genocide.

He used his platform to show the corpse of a civilian with his hands tied behind his back to show the devastating trail of destruction that Russian troops have left in the Kyiv Oblast after retreating from the north of Ukraine.

He said: ‘What happened here and what’s happening all over Ukraine is not a special operation. This is not military objects. This is civilians that have been shot in the head with tied hands behind their back.

‘This is a genocide of the Ukrainian population and that’s exactly what the Russian regime, Putin’s regime, the Russian army is doing.

‘Killing the civilians with tied hands behind their back and with a shot in the head.’

Russia’s defence ministry has denied accusations of Russian troops killing civilians in Bucha. 

The Associated Press said its journalists saw the bodies of at least 21 people in various spots around Bucha. 

One group of nine, all in civilian clothes, were scattered around a site that residents said Russian troops used as a base. They appeared to have been killed at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs, one was shot in the head, another’s legs were bound, the journalists said.  

Ukraine’s prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said the bodies of 410 civilians have been removed from the Kyiv area towns that were recently retaken from Russian forces. 

Charles Michel, president of the European Council, said further EU sanctions against Russians and support for Ukrainians are ‘on their way’ after the images were published.

In a tweet, he added: ‘Shocked by haunting images of atrocities committed by Russian army in Kyiv liberated region

‘EU is assisting Ukraine & NGO’s in gathering of necessary evidence for pursuit in international courts.’  

**WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT** 

Boris Johnson has condemned Russia’s despicable attacks’ on Ukrainians living in the besieged cities of Bucha and Irpin after a van with ‘children’ written on it was found riddled with bullet holes

Communal workers were seen carrying bodies of civilians killed by shelling from Russian troops in Bucha into the back of a van

Kyiv’s Mayor Vitali Klitschko (right) talks with people in the town of Bucha alongside his brother Wladimir Klitschko (left)

Ukrainian Soldiers inspect destroyed Russian military machinery in Bucha after recapturing the town from Russian forces

Ukrainian refugees look out a bus window as they leave their homes in Bucha on Sunday, April 3. Russia have been accused of ‘genocide’ during their invasion of the area

In a statement, Mr Johnson said the UK is ‘stepping up’ its sanctions and military support, and ‘bolstering’ humanitarian help for those on the ground.

He said: ‘Russia’s despicable attacks against innocent civilians in Irpin and Bucha are yet more evidence that Putin and his army are committing war crimes in Ukraine.

‘No denial or disinformation from the Kremlin can hide what we all know to be the truth – Putin is desperate, his invasion is failing, and Ukraine’s resolve has never been stronger.

‘I will do everything in my power to starve Putin’s war machine. We are stepping up our sanctions and military support, as well as bolstering our humanitarian support package to help those in need on the ground.

‘The UK has been at the forefront of supporting the international Criminal Court’s investigation into atrocities committed in Ukraine. The Justice Secretary has authorised additional financial support and the deployment of specialist investigators – we will not rest until justice is served.’

It is understood this refers to support for the ICC’s investigation announced last week.

The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) said on March 24 that an additional £1 million in funding would be provided, and soldiers with military expertise would be assigned to the ICC to help uncover evidence.

Scotland Yard’s War Crimes Team would also be mobilised to assist the investigation, it added.

Other European leaders also condemned the reported attacks on Ukranian civilians in response to images of bodies in the streets and some of the dead with their hands tied behind their backs.

Leaders in France, Germany, Italy, Greece, Czech Republic and Poland expressed outrage at the images. 

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala called the images ‘horrifying’ and said Russia has been committing war crimes.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said international organizations should be given access to the areas to independently document the atrocities.

French Foreign Affairs Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said his country will work with Ukrainian authorities and the International Criminal Court ‘to ensure these acts don’t go unpunished’.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the graphic images coming out of Bucha, Ukraine, after Russian troops withdrew show ‘a brutality against civilians we haven’t seen in Europe for decades’.

He told CNN’s State of the Union that ‘it’s absolutely unacceptable that civilians are targeted and killed’ and that it’s Russian President Vladimir Putin’s responsibility to stop the war.

Stoltenberg said it is ‘extremely important’ that the International Criminal Court opened an investigation into potential war crimes in Ukraine and that those responsible are held to account. 

Earlier on Sunday, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said ‘indiscriminate’ attacks by Russian forces against innocent civilians in Irpin and Bucha must be investigated as war crimes.

Ms Truss said the UK would ‘not rest’ until those responsible for ‘atrocities’ in Ukraine had faced justice, adding that Russia would not be allowed to cover up its involvement through ‘cynical disinformation’.

A Ukrainian soldier waves the country’s flag at a checkpoint in Bucha, not far from the capital city of Kyiv, on Saturday, April 2

A man looks over a mass grave in Bucha. Western nations, including the UK, have accused Vladimir Putin and the Russian forces of carrying out ‘despicable attacks’ there

Tanya Nedashkivska reacts as she mourns her husband Vasyl Ivanovych, who served in the navy, and was killed by Russian soldiers, next to his grave at the garden of their residential building in Bucha

A Ukrainian soldier carries a machine gun salvaged from a destroyed Russian military machinery in the areas recaptured by the Ukrainian army

A woman carrying two shopping bags walks past a destroyed Russian army tank, not far from the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv

Ukrainian refugees look out of a bus window as they are taken away from the areas surrounding Kyiv following a Russian troop withdrawal

Ukrainian soldiers inspect destroyed Russian military machinery in the areas recaptured by the Ukrainian army on Sunday

Associated Press journalists in Bucha saw the bodies of at least nine people in civilian clothes who appeared to have been killed at close range. At least two had their hands tied behind their backs

A woman hugs a Ukrainian serviceman after a convoy of military and aid vehicles arrived in the formerly Russian-occupied Kyiv suburb of Bucha

An elderly woman cries near her house in Bucha where the mayor said 280 people had been buried in a mass grave and that the area is littered with corpses

Workers were seen clearing a number of bodies that had been lining the streets of Bucha on Sunday morning

Oleksiy Arestovych, an adviser to Zelensky, said Sunday scores of killed civilians have been found on the streets of Irpin, Bucha and Hostomel after the withdrawal of Russian troops and compared the scene to ‘a horror movie’.

Arestovych said some victims were shot in the head and had their hands bound, and some of the bodies had signs of torture. He accused Russian troops of raping women and trying to burn their bodies.

Arestovych said Ukrainian authorities will investigate the alleged war crimes and track down the perpetrators.

Residents of Bucha have given harrowing accounts of how Russian troops shot and killed civilians without any apparent reason.

Bodies of civilians lay strewn across the northern town, which was controlled by Russian soldiers for about a month. 

At a logistics compound that residents say was used as a base by Russian forces, the bodies of eight men could be seen dumped on the ground, some with their hands tied behind their backs.

Residents say Russian troops would go from building to building, take people out of the basements where they were hiding from the fighting, check their phones for evidence of anti-Russian activity and take them away or shoot them. 

Russia’s Defense Ministry has rejected the claims of atrocities against civilians in Bucha and other suburbs of Kyiv as a ‘provocation’.

The ministry says that ‘not a single civilian has faced any violent action by the Russian military’ in Bucha.

Mr Zelensky’s spokesman Sergey Nikiforov said authorities in Ukraine had found what looked ‘exactly like war crimes’, including the bodies of executed civilians and mass graves.

Mr Nikiforov told the BBC’s Sunday Morning programme the scenes discovered in de-occupied territories such as Bucha were ‘really hard to describe’.

He said: ‘We found mass graves. We found people with their hands and with their legs tied up… and with shots, bullet holes, in the back of their head.

‘They were clearly civilians and they were executed.

‘We found half-burned bodies as if somebody tried to hide their crimes but they didn’t have enough time to do it properly.’

Meanwhile, Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said ‘the world must take note’ of events in Ukraine.

Asked if alleged war crimes should be brought to the ICC, he told Sky’s Sophy Ridge On Sunday: ‘I think it is absolutely right that this is all properly documented. This matters.

‘We’ve seen in war before, it matters that this is documented and that cases are capable of being brought to international justice.’

Mr Shapps said he spoke to his Ukrainian counterpart, infrastructure minister Oleksandr Kubrakov, on Saturday night.

‘He is very, very determined – actually wanted to speak to me last night about the rebuilding of their country when this is all over, so I think they believe and are optimistic that they will win this war and push Putin back,’ he said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Sunday that Russia is engaging in ‘genocide’ after mass graves and at least 280 people were found dead in a commuter city outside Kyiv as Putin’s troops started fleeing the capital city.

The Ukrainian leader said that for de-occupation to be successful, he will accept nothing less than Putin’s full withdrawal from all of Ukraine – including resource-rich areas in the east.

Zelensky said that he will be willing to sit down with Putin again once there is a ceasefire in place and Russian troops leave Ukraine, adding that the world cannot expect him to have further discussions with the authoritarian leader while there is still an active attack.   

Four people, all thought to be civilians, were found dead under a blanket on the side of a highway close to Bucha, Ukraine

A man walks with bags of food gave for the Ukranian army in Bucha. Former heavyweight champion boxer Wladimir Klitschko visited Bucha to accuse Putin of ‘genocide’ after mass graves filled with civilian corpses were found after Russian troops left the Kyiv suburb

A member of a civilian defence force looks underneath a blanket where four people, all thought to be civilians, were found dead near Bucha

A Ukrainian serviceman uses a piece of wood to check if the body of a man dressed in civilian clothing is booby-trapped with explosive devices

Kyiv’s Mayor Vitali Klitschko (R) talks with people in the town of Bucha, near the Ukrainian capital Kyiv

On Saturday evening, Downing Street said Mr Johnson had spoken with Zelensky and congratulated the country’s ‘brave armed forces for successfully pushing back Russia’s invading army in a number of areas’.

A spokesman said the Prime Minister ‘recognised the huge challenges’ that remain and the ‘immense suffering being inflicted on civilians’.

A Downing Street spokesman added: ‘The Prime Minister updated President Zelenskyy on the progress made at last week’s military donor conference, convened by the UK with 35 countries, and committed to continue to step up defensive support.

‘President Zelenskyy underscored the urgency of Ukraine’s fight for its survival as a free and democratic nation and the importance of international assistance.

‘President Zelenskyy also updated on the status on peace negotiations and welcomed further UK involvement in these diplomatic efforts. Both leaders agreed on the importance of continuing to ratchet up sanctions to increase the economic pressure on Putin’s war machine, so long as Russian troops remain on Ukrainian territory.

‘They committed to remain in close contact and speak again in the coming days.’

Ukrainians claimed Russian forces ‘booby-trap corpses and execute civilians while retreating from the recaptured Kyiv area’.

Horrific images emerged of bodies strewn across the streets of Bucha, which was retaken by Ukrainian forces on Friday.

The mayor, Anatoly Fedoruk, last night said: ‘We have already buried 280 people in mass graves.’

The corpses of at least 20 men in civilian clothes were found lying along a single residential street. One had his hands tied behind his back with white cloth. A Ukrainian passport lay on the ground nearby.

‘All these people were shot, killed, in the back of the head,’ Mr Fedoruk said.

He added that many of the bodies had white bandages on them ‘to show that they were unarmed’ and that a 14-year-old boy was among the dead.

He claimed some of the victims had tried to cross the Buchanka river to Ukrainian-controlled territory and that entire families had perished, including ‘children, women, grandmothers. These are the consequences of Russian occupation,’ he added.

A Ukrainian soldier passes by destroyed Russian tanks in the village of Dmytrivka close to Kyiv, Ukraine, Saturday, Apr. 2, 2022. As Russian forces pull back from Ukraine’s capital region, retreating troops are creating a ‘catastrophic’ situation for civilians by leaving mines around homes, abandoned equipment and ‘even the bodies of those killed,’ Zelensky warned Saturday

A Ukrainian soldier inspects a damaged Russian tank depicting the ‘V’ sign as their armed forces continue to share photographs of heavy Russian losses

Local residents in the village of Dmitrivka, near Kyiv, emerge from their homes and begin clearing away the burned remains of Russian tanks after a string of successful Ukrainian counterattacks

Kira Rudik, an MP, posted a video of the horrifying scene on Twitter and wrote: ‘Russians were killing people with their hands tied behind their backs and left the bodies near the road. I am shaking.’

Bucha, a suburban town of 28,000 people, has been left devastated by the fighting.

Shell explosions have blown gaping holes in apartment blocks and crushed cars litter the streets, according to the first journalists to reach the town.

Sixteen of the 20 corpses found on one street were lying either on the pavement or by the verge. Three were sprawled in the middle of the road and another was lying in the courtyard of a house. One appeared to have been killed as he rode his bicycle.

All were wearing civilian clothes, including jackets or tracksuit tops, jeans or jogging bottoms, and trainers or boots. 

Mr Zelensky warned that Moscow’s retreating troops are creating ‘a complete disaster’ in suburbs and towns outside Kyiv. 

Shattered homes, military equipment and even the bodies of those killed have been rigged with explosives as Russian forces withdraw, he said in his nightly video address to the nation. 

‘They are mining the whole territory. They are mining homes, mining equipment, even the bodies of people who were killed. There are a lot of tripwires, a lot of other dangers,’ he said.

Local troops have been removing bodies from the roads with long cables for fear they might have been rigged to explode.

One resident in the commuter town of Bucha said departing Russian troops were indiscriminately shooting civilians as they left.

‘Those people were just walking and they shot them without any reason. Bang,’ one resident said, declining to give his name for safety reasons.

‘In the next neighbourhood, Stekolka, it was even worse. They would shoot without asking any question.’ 

An aerial picture shows burned Russian armoured vehicles in the outskirts of Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine, on Friday

Columns of Russian armoured vehicles have been reduced to rubble as President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s troops continue to repel Russian forces, and in some instances recapture roads and settlements near to Kyiv

Last night, there were signs that peace talks were at a stage where Zelensky could meet in person with Putin. 

The head of the Ukraine delegation, David Arakhamia, told local television that Russia accepted Ukraine’s overall position, with the exception of its stance on Crimea.

Russia did not comment on the claims. The talks would most likely take place in Turkey but both sides have described negotiations in recent days as difficult.

The former UN chief prosecutor Carla Del Ponte also called Vladimir Putin a ‘war criminal’ and called for an international arrest warrant for him. 

Ms Del Ponte was in charge of prosecutions of war crime tribunals for the UN in the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda.

Even though several areas have seen Russian retreats, Zelensky said he expected towns they have departed to endure missile and rocket strikes from afar.

He has also cautioned that: ‘It’s still not possible to return to normal life, as it used to be, even at the territories that we are taking back after the fighting.’

As Ukrainian troops advance into areas once controlled by their enemies they are discovering large columns of destroyed Russian armored vehicles.  

Since the conflict began in late February, Russia has lost an estimated 143 planes, 131 helicopters, 625 tanks and 316 artillery pieces.

Russia has also fired at least 1,100 missiles, raising questions about how long it can maintain such an expenditure rate. 

Putin will ‘have one day to answer to God’ for ‘absolute viciousness’ says ex-archbishop of York John Sentamu after mass graves and 280 bodies were found outside Kyiv

By Chris Matthews for MailOnline 

The former archbishop of York has said that Vladimir Putin will ‘have one day to answer to God’ for the ‘absolute viciousness’ he is unleashing on the Ukrainian people.

John Sentamu, 72, questioned how the president, who identifies as a Russian Orthodox Christian, can say his prayers at night after inflicting acts of ‘evil’ in Ukraine.

The Russian Orthodox Church has backed Putin’s invasion of Ukraine that has seen the Russian President accused of war crimes.

Mass graves were found yesterday on the outskirts of Ukraine’s capital Kyiv, as Ukrainians claimed Russian forces ‘booby-trap corpses and execute civilians while retreating from recaptured Kyiv area’.

John Sentamu, 72, (centre), questioned how Putin, who identifies as a Russian Orthodox Christian, can say his prayers at night after inflicting acts of ‘evil’ in Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin presents flowers during a ceremony to Russian Orthodox Christian leader Patriarch Kirill last year 

Members of the public joined church leaders leading a crowd in an act of witness outside the Ukrainian embassy in Holland Park, west London

They spontaneously sang the national anthem of Ukraine in a show of solidarity

It comes after reports of mass graves and civilian execution as Russian forces retreated from the Kyiv region

Territorial defence fighters told The Times they found the mutilated bodies of 18 people, including women and children as young as 14, in a cellar.  

Horrific images emerged of bodies strewn across the streets of commuter town Bucha, which was retaken by Ukrainian forces on Friday. 

Ukraine’s foreign minister on Sunday accused Russian forces of carrying out a ‘massacre’ in the town of Bucha, while U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken described images of dead bodies there as ‘a punch in the gut’.

Russia’s defence ministry denied the Ukrainian allegations, saying footage and photographs showing dead bodies in Bucha were ‘yet another provocation’ by Kyiv.

After Ukraine said on Saturday its forces had reclaimed control of the whole Kyiv region, images of corpses in civilian clothes left behind by departing Russian troops prompted calls from officials in Ukraine and Europe for tougher sanctions on Russia.

The outrage in Ukraine and abroad added to pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin because it increased the likelihood of further Western sanctions.

However, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church held a service for Russian soldiers on Sunday in which he called on them to defend their country ‘as only Russians can’ as Moscow continues its military campaign in Ukraine.

At the lavishly decorated Main Cathedral of the Armed Forces opened two years ago in Kubinka outside Moscow, Patriarch Kirill told a group of servicemen and servicewomen that Russia was a ‘peace-loving’ country that had suffered greatly from war.

Ukrainian policemen check the wreckage of Russian tanks and armoured personnel carriers (APC) in Dmytrivka village, west of Kyiv, on April 2

Ukrainian servicemen walk next to destroyed Russian tanks and armoured personnel carriers (APC) in Dmytrivka

‘We absolutely do not strive for war or to do anything that could harm others,’ said the patriarch, a close ally of President Vladimir Putin.

‘But we have been raised throughout our history to love our fatherland. And we will be ready to protect it, as only Russians can defend their country.’

Kirill, 75, has previously made statements defending Moscow’s actions in Ukraine and sees the war as a bulwark against a Western liberal culture that he considers decadent, particularly over the acceptance of homosexuality.

His support for the military intervention, in which thousands of soldiers and Ukrainian civilians have been killed, has angered some within the Orthodox church at home as well as in churches abroad linked to the Moscow Patriarchate.

Mr Sentamu joined other church leaders today in saying prayers outside the Ukrainian Embassy in Holland Park, west London.

Around a hundred Christians, including some from Ukraine, held a minute’s silence for the war-torn country while holding blue and yellow hearts in the air.

Mr Sentamu described Ukraine as a ‘very, very strong Christian country’ and condemned the violence seen over the weekend in Bucha, near Kyiv, as ‘brutality, absolute viciousness’. 

When asked whether Mr Putin can ever be forgiven for his actions in the eyes of the church, Mr Sentamu said: ‘First of all, the people who are going to forgive him are the Ukrainians, and the rest of us can try to remind him that the Cross of Jesus is the end of violence.

‘If you really wear a cross like I do, you must be non-violent.

Ukrainian servicemen ride on a fighting vehicle outside Kyiv, Ukraine, Saturday, April 2, 2022. As Russian forces pull back from Ukraine’s capital region, retreating troops are creating a ‘catastrophic’ situation for civilians by leaving mines around homes, abandoned equipment and ‘even the bodies of those killed,’ President Volodymyr Zelenskyy warned Saturday. (AP Photo/Vadim Ghirda)

Destroyed cars are seen on a highway 20km from Kyiv, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues, in Kyiv region, Ukraine, April 2, 2022. REUTERS/Mikhail Palinchak

A Ukrainian soldier passes by destroyed Russian tanks in the village of Dmytrivka close to Kyiv, Ukraine, Saturday, April 2, 2022. At least ten Russian tanks were destroyed in the fighting two days ago in Dmytrivka. (AP Photo/Efrem Lukatsky)

‘To unleash such brutality is just beyond me.

‘If I was a Russian Orthodox Bishop, actually, I would be going and telling Putin that what he’s doing is contrary to the love of God, contrary to humanity as we know it, contrary really to anything else.

‘To invade another free country in the way he is doing is just not on.

‘He will have one day to answer to God.’

When asked whether he held any hope in the ability of Christian leaders to appeal to Mr Putin through religious reasoning, he said: ‘What I would say to him, is whenever you see the poor, the vulnerable, looking at you – that’s Jesus looking at you.

‘Because he [Jesus] is among the poor, the weak, the vulnerable, the unloved.

‘So Putin, if he is saying he is doing all this – how can he say his prayers at night, particularly that phrase in the Lord’s Prayer: “Deliver us from evil?”

Destroyed cars are seen on a highway 20km from Kyiv, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues, in Kyiv region, Ukraine, April 2, 2022. REUTERS/Mikhail Palinchak

‘How can he do evil acts and then say: “I’m on God’s side” – never, never, never.’

Mr Sentamu said he visited Odesa in 1983 and was overcome with the ‘remarkable’ hospitality of the residents there, so he was saddened to see the city had heard explosions this weekend.

Reverend Dyfrig Rees, 62, general secretary of the Union of Welsh Independents, which represents 350 congregational churches in the nation, also attended the act of witness with his wife, Mandy Rees, 62.

He said he hoped Ukrainians would find people around the world saying prayers for them ‘inspiring and encouraging’.

Mr Rees said: ‘I’m sure that if someone tells someone now in Ukraine there were 100 people in London thinking about you praying for you and standing with you, I’m sure that’s going to keep them going.

‘I felt pride and I felt inspired and I felt filled with hope and joy.’