Images released this weekend show civilian bodies strewn across a street following the withdrawal of Russian forces, and CNN reporters observed a mass grave in the town, with residents saying they believe at least 150 people are buried there.
The scenes out of the Kyiv suburb of Bucha have drawn international outrage, with Western leaders calling for war crimes investigations and fresh sanctions against Russia.
US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield is expected to call on the UN to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council on Tuesday, which she'll be doing at the President's direction, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said during Monday's press briefing.
"He believes it's ludicrous for Russia to be a member of the Human Rights Council and certainly the ambassador spoke to this today ... and she will continue to make the case in her role when she returns to New York," Psaki said.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Sunday that the State Department would help document any attacks by Russian troops against Ukrainian civilians. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg called the deaths of civilians in Bucha a "brutality" and said "I strongly welcome" an investigation by International Criminal Court, which has opened an investigation into war crimes in Ukraine.
The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed the extensive footage of dead civilians in Bucha was "fake" and that "not a single local resident suffered from any violent actions" during Russia's occupation of the town. "In the settlements of the Kiev region, Russian military personnel delivered and issued 452 tons of humanitarian aid to civilians," the ministry said in a statement.
President of the United States Joe Biden has called for Vladimir Putin to be tried for war crimes as western leaders prepared a fresh round of economic sanctions against Moscow amid mounting global outrage over claims of civilian killings by Russian soldiers in Ukraine.
The US president was responding to harrowing images broadcast around the world after the discovery over the weekend of a mass grave and bodies in civilian clothes, some with their hands bound, in the town of Bucha, near Kyiv.
“You may remember I got criticised for calling Putin a war criminal,” Biden told reporters at the Fort McNair army post in Washington. “Well, the truth of the matter – we saw it happen in Bucha – he is a war criminal.”
“But we have to gather the information. We have to continue to provide Ukraine with the weapons they need to continue to fight, and we have to get all the detail [to] have a war crimes trial. This guy is brutal and what’s happening in Bucha is outrageous.”
There is mounting international anger over the alleged killing of civilians in Bucha, a town near the capital Kyiv.
"This guy is brutal," Biden said of the Russian leader, adding that he believes Putin "is a war criminal".
Without evidence, Russia said images of atrocities had been staged by Ukraine.
Biden's intervention follows the publication of new satellite photos by the earth observation company Maxar, which show bodies lining Bucha's streets during its occupation by Russian forces.
With disclosures by Ukrainian officials that more than 400 civilian corpses had been discovered, a chorus has resounded at the highest levels of Western political power, calling for accountability, prosecution and punishment. On Monday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denounced the killings as “genocide” and “war crimes,” and U.S. President Joe Biden said Vladimir Putin was “a war criminal” who should be brought to trial.
But the path to holding the Russian president and other top leaders criminally responsible is long and complex, international lawyers caution.
“Certainly, the discovery of bodies which bear signs of executions -- such as gunshot wounds to the head -- presents strong evidence of war crimes,” said Clint Williamson, who served as U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues from 2006 to 2009.
“When victims are found with their hands bound, with blindfolds and bearing signs of torture or sexual assault, an even more compelling case is made. There are no circumstances under which these actions are permitted, whether the victims are civilians or military personnel who had been taken prisoner.”
