Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said “indeed, this is genocide,” referring to Russian leader Vladimir Putin’s vicious attack on his country that has seen hospitals and schools targeted by rockets, as well as disturbing new images of the bodies of executed civilians strewn throughout the streets of a suburb of the capital Kyiv.
“Indeed, this is genocide,” Zelensky told CBS News’ “Face the Nation” in a snippet of an interview that will air later Sunday morning. “The elimination of the whole nation, of the people.”
“We are the citizens of Ukraine. We have more than a hundred nationalities. This is about destruction and extermination of all these nationalities,” the Ukrainian president said.
“We are the citizens of Ukraine and we don’t want to be subdued to the policy of the Russian Federation. This is the reason we are being destroyed and exterminated. And this is happening in the Europe of the 21st century. So this is the torture of the whole nation,” Zelensky told host Margaret Brennan.
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The disturbing and graphic scenes of people executed, many with their hands bound behind them, and their bodies left uncovered in the streets were revealed Saturday when Ukrainian forces retook control of Bucha, a suburb of the capital Kyiv. Some of the victims, mostly men in civilian clothes, had been shot in the back of the head.
This story was first published in the New York Post.