More than 1,500 graves dug since June in Mariupol, according to satellite images analyzed by the BBC

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Nov. 7 () –

More than 1,500 graves have been excavated since June in an area of ​​the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, in southern Ukraine and controlled by Russian troops, according to satellite images analyzed by the British television network BBC.

According to these reports, the images show three burial sites in Staryi Krim, Manhush and Vinohradne which, according to official sources and Ukrainian witnesses, contain thousands of bodies. The images allow us to conclude that 1,500 graves have been excavated since June, bringing the total number to more than 4,600 since the start of the war.

Witnesses quoted by the aforementioned British television network have assured that they have seen during the last months representatives of the Russian authorities established in the city – now annexed to Russia – removing bodies from the rubble of the destroyed buildings.

The aforementioned chain has also published statements by residents of Mariúpol denouncing that so far they have not been able to find the bodies of family members who disappeared during the fighting, many of whom could be in mass graves in the center of the city after the removal of bodies from the streets during the clashes.

“On some terrible days we were told that there were more than a hundred bodies, sometimes 150 bodies, that had to be collected,” said Vaagn Mnatsakanian, a resident who participated in local teams digging these graves for municipal authorities. ukrainian

Others have recounted visiting makeshift morgues in Mariupol in the summer to try to find their loved ones. “People must know the truth about these horrors so that it doesn’t happen again,” said Tatiana, a woman living in the city.

Mariupol, a key port city in the war, has been a strategic target of Moscow since the beginning of the invasion, unleashed on February 24 by order of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Thus, it was bombarded and attacked with artillery for weeks, causing enormous destruction and hundreds of deaths.

Ukrainian authorities say at least 25,000 people were killed during the fighting in Mariupol, including between 5,000 and 7,000 who were buried in attacks on buildings by Russian forces.