New drone footage from the Ukrainian town of Bucha, where Russia is being accused of war crimes, appears to show two of their military vehicles shooting towards a cyclist.
Sky News has geolocated the clip to Yablonska Street in the Kyiv commuter town – where in recent days other satellite images have revealed corpses on the side of the road.
The drone footage shows a person cycling on a road before getting off the bike near the junction with Yablonska Street and pushing it around the corner.
A military vehicle is seen firing one shot down the street and at least a further five once the cyclist turns the corner.
The vehicle – a BMD-2 infantry fighting vehicle – appears to have the letter V marked on the side, which the Russians use to differentiate their equipment from Ukraine’s. Other vehicles in the area also have the V marking.
Professor Michael Clarke, former director-general at defence think tank RUSI, told Sky News: “The V is very important for unit identification – for other vehicles and from the air – as the Ukrainians use most of the same equipment as the Russians.”
A second vehicle then fires and smoke or dust is seen rising at the point where a body and bicycle are seen next to each other in aftermath footage.
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Since Russian forces began leaving the Kyiv region around 30 March, harrowing images of corpses with their hands tied behind their backs and seemingly shot at close range have come to light in Bucha.
They have sparked international condemnation, accusations of war crimes from US President Joe Biden, and claims of genocide from Ukrainian President Volodymr Zelenskyy.
Russian officials claim the pictures have been “staged” by Ukrainian forces to garner support from the West – and those seen dead were killed after Russian troops left.
But satellite images from Planet, tweeted by the investigative journalism group Bellingcat, dated 11 March confirm the white building at the scene of the cyclist shooting was destroyed that day – around three weeks before the Russians left.
Further aerial images from 19 March also appear to contradict Moscow’s claims about what happened in Bucha.
They show the same area of the town, which is 16 miles from Kyiv, with pavements dotted with what appear to be dead bodies.
This date is also more than a week before Russian forces left the area and confirms the bodies have been lying there for weeks.
Mr Zelenskyy addressed the UN Security Council on Tuesday where he claimed Russia is “pursuing its policy of destroying ethnic and religious diversity during its invasion of Ukraine”.
Urging member nations to support a war crimes investigation, he added that Moscow is “deliberately creating conditions in occupied territories so that as many civilians as possible are killed”.
Targeting unarmed civilians is a breach of international humanitarian war. Ukraine and its Western allies have been compiling evidence for potential war crimes prosecution since the start of the conflict.
But Professor Clarke says that despite the visual evidence, Russia could argue several reasons for shooting the cyclist, making it very difficult to prosecute for war crimes.
They could claim the person was not clearly a civilian or may have presented a terror threat. Alternatively they could argue the vehicle was firing at something out of view or went off by accident, he added.
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