Editor’s Note: This article contains graphic images and descriptions of violence.
The soldiers emerge and stagger along the dusty track, then drop to their knees, hands on their heads. Seconds later, Ukrainian drone footage shows them lying face down, motionless, with dust floating nearby.
Video obtained exclusively by CNN, filmed during fighting in late August near the besieged town of Pokrovsk in eastern Ukraine, shows an apparent execution by Russian troops of three surrendering Ukrainians after their trench was overrun.
The incident, described by a Ukrainian official who asked that some details be withheld to protect the identity of the unit, is part of a series of apparent executions that appear to be increasing in pace this year.
Ukrainian defense intelligence sources have provided CNN with a list of 15 cases since November, most supported by drone video or audio intercepts, in which they claim surrendering Ukrainian soldiers were killed by Russians on the front lines, rather than taken prisoner.
Ukraine’s prosecutor general told CNN that his office is investigating 28 such incidents since the start of the war, in which a total of 62 Ukrainian servicemen have been killed.
The images from the Pokrovsk region appear to reflect the brutal and relentless tactics of the Russian military as it continues to advance in eastern Ukraine.
Moscow’s advance toward Ukraine’s strategic military hub of Pokrovsk continues, despite kyiv’s recent gains in Russia’s Kursk border region, which have fueled hopes that the Kremlin will be forced to divert troops to defend Russia’s own borders.
Ukrainian prosecutors told CNN they believe the alleged killings were war crimes and part of a policy orchestrated by the Kremlin. “If prisoners of war surrender, if they prove that they surrender, if they don’t have weapons in their hands, then summary execution is a war crime,” Andriy Kostin, Ukraine’s prosecutor general, told CNN.
Kostin argued that such crimes were committed in different regions of Ukraine, by different units, which gave Kiev “the opportunity to claim that such a policy can be called a crime against humanity. This policy is orchestrated by the Kremlin. This is an order of specific commanders.”
The Russian Defense Ministry has not yet responded to CNN’s request for comment on the allegations.
The emergence of videos showing what appear to be escalating Russian tactics has presented a dilemma for Ukrainian commanders, who face the unenviable task of warning their troops and the world of Russian savagery, at the risk of undermining already depleted Ukrainian morale.
The Ukrainian official who provided the Pokrovsk drone footage said his unit was aware of several similar cases on the front lines that had not been made public or investigated.
Recent cases have been made public, including a unit in Toretsk that claimed on Telegram to have in its possession a drone video, published Tuesday, showing three Ukrainian soldiers emerging from a basement with their hands raised in surrender and then being shot dead by Russian troops. Prosecutors in the Donetsk region said they had opened an investigation into “violation of the laws and customs of war, combined with intentional murder.”
Several Russian servicemen accused of such killings have been put on trial, including in the Zaporizhzhia region in southern Ukraine. Ukrainian prosecutors say the Russian was a convict who was released from a robbery sentence in November to serve in the Russian army’s 127th Motorized Rifle Division. Prosecutors have released drone footage supporting their claims that the Russian shot a Ukrainian soldier in January as he emerged from his trench near Priyutne with his arms raised and then knelt down.
CNN has obtained another drone video, also from the Zaporozhye region, showing how in May of this year, near the hotly contested village of Robotyne, Russian troops ordered three Ukrainian soldiers to lie face down on the ground after their shelter was overrun. Ukrainian defense intelligence provided CNN with audio transcripts of intercepts of what they say was an order from a Russian commander, known as “Turk,” to his subordinate on the ground, “Maloy,” to kill the prisoners.
TURK: Drop them, fucking zero them, zero them.
MALOY: Understood, received.
TURK: Once you zero them in, give us your feedback.
The drone video shows how, once the three Ukrainians are out of the trench and lying face down on the ground, the Russians open fire.
As Russian President Vladimir Putin faces an arrest warrant from the International Criminal Court for his role in an alleged scheme to forcibly deport Ukrainian children to Russia, Kiev is actively pursuing genocide charges against Moscow. Kostin, the prosecutor general, has suggested that the systematic nature of these alleged battlefield executions could be part of a broader genocide case.
The UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, Dr Morris Tidball-Binz, visited Ukraine in May at the invitation of kyiv, partly to look into reports of extrajudicial executions during the fighting.
A source in the UN investigation told CNN that some of the alleged executions of Ukrainian soldiers have been investigated. “There are many. There is a pattern. It suggests some complacency, even an order to give no quarter,” the source said, referring to the practice of showing no mercy.
“These killings are considered war crimes individually,” the source said, “and together they could constitute crimes against humanity.”
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