Dead men walking: Chilling new footage shows Russian troops leading Ukrainians away to be executed in latest evidence of Bucha war crimes
This is the moment Russian troops marched a column of surrendered Ukrainian defence volunteers to a courtyard where eight of them were later found executed, in just the latest evidence of war crimes by Putin's troops.
CCTV footage taken in the city of Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, was handed to the New York Times showing the men in the custody of Russian paratroopers just moments before they were shot despite having surrendered
Almost a month later, after Putin's forces fled the area having failed to take the Ukrainian capital, the bodies of the men were photographed piled in the same courtyard - some of them with their hands bound behind their backs - in images which shocked and outraged the world.
Under international law, executing surrendered soldiers is a war crime. The Times has identified the Russian units mostly likely to be responsible for the executions - the 104th and 234th Airborne Assault Regiments - opening up the possibility of prosecuting the soldiers and their commanders for the massacre.
It comes amid calls by President Volodymyr Zelensky and his Western allies for Putin, his generals and armed forces to face the full force of the law over the invasion. Zelensky and a handful of other world leaders have gone so far as to call Russia's invasion an attempted 'genocide'.
Newly-uncovered CCTV footage shows two Russian paratroopers escorting a line of nine Ukrainian territorial defence volunteers who had surrendered to an office building in the city of Bucha where eight of them were later found dead
Bucha and the nearby city of Irpin, located to the northwest of Kyiv, became the backdrop of some of the worst massacres of the Ukraine war so far when they were captured by Russian forces in March.
Having initially been repulsed from the area after suffering heavy casualties in late February, Russian troops returned and captured Bucha on March 3, taking some newly-recruited territorial defence soldiers by surprise.
Among those soldiers were six of the men seen in the video, according to the Times, were manning a checkpoint in Bucha with just one grenade and one rifle between them.
Hopelessly outnumbered and outgunned, they reported the Russian advance to their comrades and then went into hiding in a nearby house along with the homeowner who had been bringing them food and drinks. They were soon joined by two other fighters, who sheltered with them.
The group survived just one night in hiding before being discovered by Russian troops doing house-to-house searches on March 4.
They hauled the group out, searched them for tattoos that could indicate they were soldiers then marched them down the street to an office building where they had set up a command post. It was during this walk that the new CCTV footage was recorded.