Ukraine’s foreign minister on Monday urged the International Criminal Court to probe footage circulating on social media that he said showed Russian forces killing a Ukrainian prisoner of war.
“Horrific video of an unarmed Ukrainian POW executed by Russian forces merely for saying ‘Glory to Ukraine.’ Another (piece of) proof this war is genocidal,” Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba wrote on social media.
Kuleba said it was “imperative” that International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim Khan “launches an immediate ICC investigation into this heinous war crime.”
“Perpetrators must face justice,” he added.
He was referring to what appears to be amateur footage of a detained combatant standing in a shallow trench, wearing camouflage and smoking a cigarette, being shot to death with automatic weapons after saying “glory to Ukraine.”
AFP could not independently verify where or when the footage was filmed or whether it showed — as some Ukrainian officials and social media users suggested — a Ukrainian prisoner of war being shot.
The phrase spoken by the alleged detained Ukrainian soldier was trending on social media and senior officials in Kyiv blamed Russian forces and called for justice.
“Today, a video appeared of the occupiers brutally killing a soldier, who bravely said to their faces: ‘Glory to Ukraine!’,” Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening address.
Moscow and Kyiv have on several occasions accused the other side of killing prisoners in the year since Russia invaded Ukraine.
The Wagner mercenary group spearheading Russia’s assault on Bakhmut in eastern Ukraine is largely comprised of Russian men recruited from prisons throughout the country.
