The announcement comes days after Russian forces took control of the strategic coastal city after a three-month siege, and surrendered all Ukrainian fighters who were trapped in the Azovstal industrial complex.
Earlier, the mayor of Mariupol announced that Russian forces bury Ukrainian civilians killed in the conflict in order to “cover up military crimes”, while a private American company confirmed that it had taken satellite images proving the existence of a recently expanded mass grave near Mariupol.
Before Mariupol fell to the Russian forces, Mariupol Mayor Vadim Boychenko said that “the Russians buried hundreds of civilians outside Mariupol,” adding: “Bodies began to disappear from the city’s streets,” accusing the Russians of “hiding traces of their crimes and using mass graves as a tool.”
For its part, the private American company “Maxar Technologies” confirmed, Thursday, that satellite images taken near the city of Mariupol “reveal the site of a mass grave that was expanded in the past weeks, to include more than two hundred new graves.”
She added, “An examination of the photos from mid-March to mid-April indicates that the cemetery’s expansion began between March 23 and 26,” according to Reuters.
He added that Russian forces “dug huge trenches near Manush, 20 kilometers west of Mariupol.”
And he added, “They are transporting the bodies of the dead residents of Mariupol in trucks, and throwing them in those trenches. They are hiding their military crimes,” according to the Associated Press.
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