At least 441 civilians were killed by Russian forces in the early days of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, the UN Human Rights Office said on Wednesday, recording summary executions and attacks in dozens of cities in three regions.

The actual death toll in Kiev, Chernihiv and Sumy regions was likely much higher, the agency said in a report spanning the period from the start of the invasion on February 24 to early April, when Russian troops withdrew from those areas.

“These actions were carried out by the Russian armed forces controlling these areas, as a result of which 441 civilians (341 men, 72 women, 20 boys and 8 girls) were killed,” the report says.

Through the United Nations Human Rights Watch in Ukraine, UNHCR collected data from 102 towns and villages.

Moscow has repeatedly denied that it is targeting civilians as part of a so-called “special military operation” to disarm its neighbor and remove “dangerous nationalists” from power. Ukraine and its Western allies are calling the attack an “unprovoked land grab.”

In total, the UN has counted 6,702 civilian deaths in the war as of December 4 and says it is detecting human rights violations by all parties involved.

Intentional killing of civilians is considered a grave violation of the Geneva Conventions and a war crime under the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.

The scope of the new report was limited to Russian-controlled areas in the early days of fighting due to “the prevalence of allegations of killings of civilians in these three areas” and the UN agency’s ability to verify and document deaths there after the withdrawal of Russian troops. .

In October, a UN commission concluded that Russian troops were responsible for the vast majority of human rights violations in the early days of the war.

According to the report, many of the bodies documented in the new report showed signs that the victims may have been killed on purpose. Since the end of October, the UN continues to try to confirm another 198 alleged killings of civilians in three regions during this time.

In fact, “most of the victims were targeted while going to work, delivering food to those in need, visiting neighbors or relatives, or trying to avoid hostilities,” the report says.

According to the report, some areas suffered heavy losses, such as the city of Bucha on the outskirts of Kyiv, which was under the control of Russian troops from 5 to 30 March. The UN said it had documented the killing of 73 civilians in Butse and was in the process of confirming another 105 cases.

Source: Reuters.