The mutilated towns and villages of Kyiv, Chernihiv, Sumy, and Kharkiv regions share a common tragedy, experienced during the occupation. After the liberation of a part of the Kharkiv region from the invading troops, mass graves and torture chambers were found on the territory from Vovchansk to Izyum.
A bombed-out town, mass graves, and torture sites where locals were abused - this is how the Russian army left Izyum. The Kremlin propaganda denied all accusations and promptly responded to the footage from the liberated Izyum by manipulating sensitive topics.
Lenta:
“Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov explained the discovery of graves in the Ukrainian town of Izium. This was reported by a correspondent of Lenta.ru.
According to him, the Ukrainian authorities showed not mass graves, but a cemetery with ordinary graves. “Each grave had an Orthodox cross, meaning that people were buried, and Ukrainians began to dig them up,” he said.”
The propaganda also spread disinformation with a photo of the grave of a family that was killed in their home by a Russian airstrike on March 9.
“Reporter: “It is worth paying attention to the fact that the graves bear the date of death on March 9, 2022. The piquancy of the situation is that Russian troops took Izium on April 1. Thus, all the graves in the area before that were made by the Ukrainian authorities, and now they are tearing open the graves of those they themselves buried for the media. So who mocked people and tied their hands behind their backs before killing them?”
Darya Gerasymchuk, advisor to the Presidential Office for Children's Rights and Child Rehabilitation, said that on March 9, the Russian army killed six members of one family by dropping an air bomb on a house in Izium. It then targeted the house from a tank. At least 44 people were killed in the rubble.
“In the town where 447 bodies of Ukrainians were found, 3 mass graves were discovered. Some of these people were brutally murdered, many of them were tortured before their deaths,” Danylo Pavlov captioned the photo on his Instagram.
The most cynical statements about the tragedy in Izium came from propagandists from Ukraine.
Podolyaka-video
“It's worth noting that photographer Malolletka was called to serve another farce in Izyum. The same one who became famous for his photos from Mariupol, in which he allegedly captured the aftermath of the “bombing” of the maternity hospital and other fakes. It seems to be a trifle. But very revealing."
Podolyaka-video is the website of Yuriy Podolyaka, a self-described analyst and military expert, who is actually a propaganda blogger originally from Ukraine. After the Revolution of Dignity, Podolyaka moved to Russia. He was sentenced in absentia to 12 years in prison for justifying Russian aggression and collaboration.
“The scriptwriters of 'Bucha-2' are surprising with their stupidity: the body that was taken out of the grave has fresh blood and clean ropes on its hands. Perhaps it is an actor in makeup, but it is highly likely that the person was deliberately killed for the 'truthfulness' of the staging.
According to French journalist Adrian Bocke, many corpses were brought to Izyum for a bloody photo shoot,” Podolyaka explains, drawing parallels with Bucha.
The propagandist refers to the words of a former French military officer, Adrian Bocke. Adrian Bocke has been repeatedly exposed for lying and spreading Kremlin propaganda around the world. He even lied about his military career. This was reported by StopFake with reference to an investigation by Liberation.
StopFake has learned that his ex-wife is of Russian descent, and his daughter's name is Lena.
“A few days ago, a mass grave was found in the vicinity of the newly liberated city of Izium. More than 400 graves. Most of them are unmarked. It is impossible to look at this, but everyone should see it!” Konstantin Liberov captioned a photo from Izyum on Instagram.
Another topic for manipulation was the tragedy of the family of a soldier whose body was found in a mass grave. His wife recognized him by his tattoo and a yellow and blue bracelet on his arm.
Х-true
“The Kyiv regime in Izyum is unable to stage a second such staging of the 'atrocities of the Russian army' as it did in Bucha; the truth about the skeleton hand with silicone bracelets in the colors of the Ukrainian flag has been revealed and came out.
The hand with the bracelet, whose photo has become a symbol of Russia's accusations of “genocide,” belongs to Serhiy Sova, a “dryer” from Nikopol. He served in the 93rd Brigade “Kholodny Yar”.
Propagandists called the hand with the bracelet “a symbol of Kyiv's propaganda”. The footage of the bracelet on the wrist of the soldier killed by Russians in Izyum stunned the society. In contrast to the propaganda messages, it became a symbol of the atrocities of the invaders.
X-true says that the Russians had to bury the Ukrainian military because the Ukrainian Armed Forces leadership refused to take them from the morgue in Izyum.
“The Russians did not leave the Ukrainian military to rot and decompose in the open air to the delight of local stray dogs and wolves that live in the Izium forests, but buried them,” the hostile publication writes.
"Detector Media" refuted this fake:
“If the leadership of the Ukrainian Armed Forces did postpone the operation to transfer the bodies of fallen soldiers from occupied Izyum, there could be only one reason for this - the constant shelling of the city by Russians. One of the crosses in the forest reads: “Ukrainian Armed Forces, 17 people, Izyum, from the morgue”. At the same time, some of the graves are without crosses. In addition, the graves of about 20 Ukrainian soldiers with their hands tied were found nearby. This may indicate that they were captured, said Dmytro Lubinets, the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights, in his Telegram.”
In a mass grave near Izyum, number 319, the body of children's writer Volodymyr Vakulenko, who was shot dead by Russians in the spring of 2022, was found. This was confirmed by DNA tests.
“There are still 74 unidentified bodies. Most of them are burials in Izyum: 56 bodies. We cannot identify them due to the lack of relatives with whom we can compare DNA,” Volodymyr Tymoshko, head of the Kharkiv National Police, explained to Gvara Media as of March 2024.
Mass graves and torture chambers were also found in the de-occupied Lyman and Sviatohirsk in Donetsk Oblast. In particular, two mass graves were found in Lyman, one with civilians and one with military personnel, and more than 130 individual graves.
“Among the civilians exhumed in the north of Donetsk region, 85 are men, 66 are women, 5 are children, and the sex of 10 more people has not been established.” The police clarified that people died from mine and shrapnel wounds as a result of Russian shelling, as well as from natural causes, there are bodies with signs of violent death,” Radio Svoboda reports.
The Associated Press has published exclusive photos and videos of mass graves in Izyum, which was recaptured by Ukrainian troops.
The first to visit the mass graves and interview officials were AP video journalist Vasilisa Stepanenko and photographer Yevhen Malolietka. According to AP, they were shown the way by local residents of Izyum.
The military had just begun clearing the area of mines and preparing for the exhumation, which was scheduled for the next day. AP reported that “Ukrainian authorities have invited international media to the grave site to begin the exhumation.”
The Associated Press published exclusive footage in the evening immediately after the video address of the President of Ukraine.
During the first 12 hours, the footage from Izyum was distributed by the world's major broadcasters. Almost all major media outlets, such as The Washington Post and The New York Times, published photos of Yevhen Malolletka.
The British media reported that “AP's coverage as evidence of a mass grave has been confirmed by leading media and officials”.
According to the newspaper, AP journalists arrived at the gravesite and saw graves marked with simple wooden crosses. Some of them had names written on them and flowers hanging from them.
Citing Ukrainian officials, the British media reported a mass grave with more than 440 bodies. Some of those buried in the pit were shot, others were killed by shelling. Many of the bodies had not yet been identified. They also found numerous “torture chambers” where both Ukrainian citizens and foreigners were held “in absolutely inhumane conditions.”
Reuters journalists also visited the mass grave site in the Izium forest. There they met a local resident, Volodymyr Kolesnyk, who was looking for the graves of his relatives.
“Holding a neatly written list of names and numbers, citizen Volodymyr Kolesnyk walked between the graves, looking for relatives he said had been killed in an airstrike on an apartment building shortly before the city fell in April, when invaders swept through the northeastern district of Kharkiv,” the British media outlet reports.
On September 19, 2022, Reuters reported the first results of the exhumation. With reference to the governor of the Kharkiv region, Oleh Syniehubov, Ukrainian forensic experts exhumed 146 bodies of mostly civilians, some of them showing signs of violent death, and two children were among the exhumed bodies.
And on October 2, 2022, the Associated Press published an investigation into the torture chambers set up by the Russians in Izyum. The investigation is based on what the journalists saw in the forest and interviews with survivors of the events, as well as with the police. The journalists heard from officials that the mass graves were heavily mined and saw bodies with their hands tied.
They managed to talk to 15 victims of torture, some of whom had been tortured more than once. They also spoke with families whose loved ones went missing.
The AP has testimony from a local doctor who treated people with torture-like injuries, such as “shots to the arms and legs, broken bones, and severe bruises and burns.”
“An Associated Press investigation found that Russian torture in Izyum was arbitrary, widespread, and completely routine for civilians and military personnel alike throughout the city,” the publication writes.
AP journalists found 10 places of torture in Izyum, and gained access to 5 of them. The torture chambers were found in a police station, a kindergarten and a residential complex.
The investigative article also mentions torture chambers in a local school and the garage of a medical clinic. Men and women were kept in the latter. The room for women was closest to the room of Russian soldiers.
The victims were thrown into pits of water, beaten with sticks, hung by their feet, tortured with gas masks and electrodes - this is just what the victims dared to tell. AP journalists found gas masks in two schools in Izyum.
“Torture in any form during armed conflict is a war crime under the Geneva Conventions, whether it is inflicted on prisoners of war or civilians,” the publication concluded.
We worked on the material:
Researcher of the topic, author of the text: Yana Yevmenova
Editor-in-Chief: Viacheslav Ratynskyi
Literary editor: Yulia Futey
Website manager: Vladyslav Kukhar
The mutilated towns and villages of Kyiv, Chernihiv, Sumy, and Kharkiv regions share a common tragedy, experienced during the occupation. After the liberation of a part of the Kharkiv region from the invading troops, mass graves and torture chambers were found on the territory from Vovchansk to Izyum.
A bombed-out town, mass graves, and torture sites where locals were abused - this is how the Russian army left Izyum. The Kremlin propaganda denied all accusations and promptly responded to the footage from the liberated Izyum by manipulating sensitive topics.
Lenta:
“Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov explained the discovery of graves in the Ukrainian town of Izium. This was reported by a correspondent of Lenta.ru.
According to him, the Ukrainian authorities showed not mass graves, but a cemetery with ordinary graves. “Each grave had an Orthodox cross, meaning that people were buried, and Ukrainians began to dig them up,” he said.”
The propaganda also spread disinformation with a photo of the grave of a family that was killed in their home by a Russian airstrike on March 9.
“Reporter: “It is worth paying attention to the fact that the graves bear the date of death on March 9, 2022. The piquancy of the situation is that Russian troops took Izium on April 1. Thus, all the graves in the area before that were made by the Ukrainian authorities, and now they are tearing open the graves of those they themselves buried for the media. So who mocked people and tied their hands behind their backs before killing them?”
Darya Gerasymchuk, advisor to the Presidential Office for Children's Rights and Child Rehabilitation, said that on March 9, the Russian army killed six members of one family by dropping an air bomb on a house in Izium. It then targeted the house from a tank. At least 44 people were killed in the rubble.
“In the town where 447 bodies of Ukrainians were found, 3 mass graves were discovered. Some of these people were brutally murdered, many of them were tortured before their deaths,” Danylo Pavlov captioned the photo on his Instagram.
The most cynical statements about the tragedy in Izium came from propagandists from Ukraine.
Podolyaka-video
“It's worth noting that photographer Malolletka was called to serve another farce in Izyum. The same one who became famous for his photos from Mariupol, in which he allegedly captured the aftermath of the “bombing” of the maternity hospital and other fakes. It seems to be a trifle. But very revealing."
Podolyaka-video is the website of Yuriy Podolyaka, a self-described analyst and military expert, who is actually a propaganda blogger originally from Ukraine. After the Revolution of Dignity, Podolyaka moved to Russia. He was sentenced in absentia to 12 years in prison for justifying Russian aggression and collaboration.
“The scriptwriters of 'Bucha-2' are surprising with their stupidity: the body that was taken out of the grave has fresh blood and clean ropes on its hands. Perhaps it is an actor in makeup, but it is highly likely that the person was deliberately killed for the 'truthfulness' of the staging.
According to French journalist Adrian Bocke, many corpses were brought to Izyum for a bloody photo shoot,” Podolyaka explains, drawing parallels with Bucha.
The propagandist refers to the words of a former French military officer, Adrian Bocke. Adrian Bocke has been repeatedly exposed for lying and spreading Kremlin propaganda around the world. He even lied about his military career. This was reported by StopFake with reference to an investigation by Liberation.
StopFake has learned that his ex-wife is of Russian descent, and his daughter's name is Lena.
“A few days ago, a mass grave was found in the vicinity of the newly liberated city of Izium. More than 400 graves. Most of them are unmarked. It is impossible to look at this, but everyone should see it!” Konstantin Liberov captioned a photo from Izyum on Instagram.
Another topic for manipulation was the tragedy of the family of a soldier whose body was found in a mass grave. His wife recognized him by his tattoo and a yellow and blue bracelet on his arm.
Х-true
“The Kyiv regime in Izyum is unable to stage a second such staging of the 'atrocities of the Russian army' as it did in Bucha; the truth about the skeleton hand with silicone bracelets in the colors of the Ukrainian flag has been revealed and came out.
The hand with the bracelet, whose photo has become a symbol of Russia's accusations of “genocide,” belongs to Serhiy Sova, a “dryer” from Nikopol. He served in the 93rd Brigade “Kholodny Yar”.
Propagandists called the hand with the bracelet “a symbol of Kyiv's propaganda”. The footage of the bracelet on the wrist of the soldier killed by Russians in Izyum stunned the society. In contrast to the propaganda messages, it became a symbol of the atrocities of the invaders.
X-true says that the Russians had to bury the Ukrainian military because the Ukrainian Armed Forces leadership refused to take them from the morgue in Izyum.
“The Russians did not leave the Ukrainian military to rot and decompose in the open air to the delight of local stray dogs and wolves that live in the Izium forests, but buried them,” the hostile publication writes.
"Detector Media" refuted this fake:
“If the leadership of the Ukrainian Armed Forces did postpone the operation to transfer the bodies of fallen soldiers from occupied Izyum, there could be only one reason for this - the constant shelling of the city by Russians. One of the crosses in the forest reads: “Ukrainian Armed Forces, 17 people, Izyum, from the morgue”. At the same time, some of the graves are without crosses. In addition, the graves of about 20 Ukrainian soldiers with their hands tied were found nearby. This may indicate that they were captured, said Dmytro Lubinets, the Verkhovna Rada Commissioner for Human Rights, in his Telegram.”
In a mass grave near Izyum, number 319, the body of children's writer Volodymyr Vakulenko, who was shot dead by Russians in the spring of 2022, was found. This was confirmed by DNA tests.
“There are still 74 unidentified bodies. Most of them are burials in Izyum: 56 bodies. We cannot identify them due to the lack of relatives with whom we can compare DNA,” Volodymyr Tymoshko, head of the Kharkiv National Police, explained to Gvara Media as of March 2024.
Mass graves and torture chambers were also found in the de-occupied Lyman and Sviatohirsk in Donetsk Oblast. In particular, two mass graves were found in Lyman, one with civilians and one with military personnel, and more than 130 individual graves.
“Among the civilians exhumed in the north of Donetsk region, 85 are men, 66 are women, 5 are children, and the sex of 10 more people has not been established.” The police clarified that people died from mine and shrapnel wounds as a result of Russian shelling, as well as from natural causes, there are bodies with signs of violent death,” Radio Svoboda reports.
The Associated Press has published exclusive photos and videos of mass graves in Izyum, which was recaptured by Ukrainian troops.
The first to visit the mass graves and interview officials were AP video journalist Vasilisa Stepanenko and photographer Yevhen Malolietka. According to AP, they were shown the way by local residents of Izyum.
The military had just begun clearing the area of mines and preparing for the exhumation, which was scheduled for the next day. AP reported that “Ukrainian authorities have invited international media to the grave site to begin the exhumation.”
The Associated Press published exclusive footage in the evening immediately after the video address of the President of Ukraine.
During the first 12 hours, the footage from Izyum was distributed by the world's major broadcasters. Almost all major media outlets, such as The Washington Post and The New York Times, published photos of Yevhen Malolletka.
The British media reported that “AP's coverage as evidence of a mass grave has been confirmed by leading media and officials”.
According to the newspaper, AP journalists arrived at the gravesite and saw graves marked with simple wooden crosses. Some of them had names written on them and flowers hanging from them.
Citing Ukrainian officials, the British media reported a mass grave with more than 440 bodies. Some of those buried in the pit were shot, others were killed by shelling. Many of the bodies had not yet been identified. They also found numerous “torture chambers” where both Ukrainian citizens and foreigners were held “in absolutely inhumane conditions.”
Reuters journalists also visited the mass grave site in the Izium forest. There they met a local resident, Volodymyr Kolesnyk, who was looking for the graves of his relatives.
“Holding a neatly written list of names and numbers, citizen Volodymyr Kolesnyk walked between the graves, looking for relatives he said had been killed in an airstrike on an apartment building shortly before the city fell in April, when invaders swept through the northeastern district of Kharkiv,” the British media outlet reports.
On September 19, 2022, Reuters reported the first results of the exhumation. With reference to the governor of the Kharkiv region, Oleh Syniehubov, Ukrainian forensic experts exhumed 146 bodies of mostly civilians, some of them showing signs of violent death, and two children were among the exhumed bodies.
And on October 2, 2022, the Associated Press published an investigation into the torture chambers set up by the Russians in Izyum. The investigation is based on what the journalists saw in the forest and interviews with survivors of the events, as well as with the police. The journalists heard from officials that the mass graves were heavily mined and saw bodies with their hands tied.
They managed to talk to 15 victims of torture, some of whom had been tortured more than once. They also spoke with families whose loved ones went missing.
The AP has testimony from a local doctor who treated people with torture-like injuries, such as “shots to the arms and legs, broken bones, and severe bruises and burns.”
“An Associated Press investigation found that Russian torture in Izyum was arbitrary, widespread, and completely routine for civilians and military personnel alike throughout the city,” the publication writes.
AP journalists found 10 places of torture in Izyum, and gained access to 5 of them. The torture chambers were found in a police station, a kindergarten and a residential complex.
The investigative article also mentions torture chambers in a local school and the garage of a medical clinic. Men and women were kept in the latter. The room for women was closest to the room of Russian soldiers.
The victims were thrown into pits of water, beaten with sticks, hung by their feet, tortured with gas masks and electrodes - this is just what the victims dared to tell. AP journalists found gas masks in two schools in Izyum.
“Torture in any form during armed conflict is a war crime under the Geneva Conventions, whether it is inflicted on prisoners of war or civilians,” the publication concluded.
We worked on the material:
Researcher of the topic, author of the text: Yana Yevmenova
Editor-in-Chief: Viacheslav Ratynskyi
Literary editor: Yulia Futey
Website manager: Vladyslav Kukhar
UAPP is an independent association of professional Ukrainian photographers, designed to protect their interests, support, develop and promote Ukrainian photography as an important element of national culture.
UAPP's activities span educational, social, research and cultural initiatives, as well as book publishing.
UAPP represents Ukrainian professional photography in the international photographic community and is an official member of the Federation of European Photographers (FEP) — an international organization representing more than 50,000 professional photographers in Europe and other countries around the world.
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