The Russian Prosecutor General’s Office drew attention to the video allegedly killing a Ukrainian soldier. supervisor initiated validation to evaluate the reliability of the frameworks.
Earlier, a recording appeared on social networks that allegedly showed the decapitation of a Ukrainian prisoner of war by Russian soldiers. The Office of the Chief Prosecutor pointed out that in the video, “an unidentified person in a camouflage uniform inflicted violence on an unidentified soldier with a knife during the summer season”.
The images were interpreted in the Kremlin. Russian President’s Press Secretary, Dmitry Peskov, stressed that it was an “absolutely terrible sight”. He noted that you must first understand how reliable they are.
“Then it can of course be an occasion to check if this is true, if it’s true. If he did, where and by whom was it done,” he said.
He stressed that “in the fake world we live in, it is necessary to check the authenticity of this attraction”.
On April 12, the founder of Gulagu.net, Vladimir Osechkin (known as a foreign agent in the Russian Federation), said he had contacted former Wagnerian Andrei Medvedev, who had fled to Norway. He allegedly identified his former colleagues in the video with the man’s decapitation.
“He clearly identifies his colleagues there, the fighters of the Wagner PMC, by their characteristic call signs, their way of speaking, the voice they say on the radio,” Osechkin said.
The head of PMC “Wagner” Yevgeny Prigozhin denied Medvedev’s words. The press service of the Concorde company published Prigozhin’s comment on its social networks: “I watched this video. The beheading of people is bad, but I could not find anywhere that it was near Bakhmut and that Wagner PMC fighters participated in the execution.
He then stated that “neither PMC “Wagner” nor the city of Bakhmut were identified in the video. Prigozhin criticized the head of the Russian anti-corruption website, calling Andrey Medvedev “stupid” and saying he had been at PMC for “two days”.
“Out of tens of thousands of Wagnerians, this Andrey Medvedev can identify one. The nonsense is complete. It doesn’t match the truth,” said Wagner PMC founder.
Ukraine’s reaction
“The video is real and a captured Ukrainian soldier is killed in this video,” Ukrainian journalist Anatoly Shariy said on his Telegram channel. “There is no performance involved here. It claims to be a real video from a real “hero” device and states that the video is from “July-August”.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said “the world should see this” after footage of the execution of an alleged Ukrainian soldier was published online.
“Everyone needs to react. Every leader. Don’t expect it to be forgotten, time will pass,” he said.
Zelensky emphasized that Ukraine has no intention of forgetting or forgiving anything. “Legal liability will be for everything. If leaders don’t react, no one will understand. We must act now! <…> The main goal is to win. “The main target is Ukraine’s earning power,” he said.
The Security Service of Ukraine has launched a pre-trial investigation under Part 2 of Art. 438 of the country’s Criminal Code – “violation of the laws and customs of war”, according to the publication “UNIAN”.
“If necessary, we will take them wherever they are: from the underworld or from the other world. But they will certainly be punished for what they did,” he said.
Deputy Minister Anna Malyar said that the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine is also doing everything to recognize the deceased.
“From the first minutes the video appeared <…> UNIAN is carefully examining it frame by frame, on April 12, by all authorized Ukrainian services,” he said.
Malyar emphasized that image identification is an extremely difficult task and it is important to understand it.
“Please respect the relatives of the deceased, and do not make any public assumptions about the identity of the deceased, even if you are absolutely sure that you knew him. We urge you to stop the distribution of this video and similar footage,” Malyar added.
Ukraine is already supported in the EU: Josep Borrell, head of European diplomacy, said he was “deeply impressed by the offensive video of the beheading of a Ukrainian prisoner of war”. “This is a vile violation of the Geneva Conventions. “We will stand by Ukraine no matter how long it takes,” he said.
CNN said the UN was “shocked by the horrific video”.