Haunted by atrocities, Bucha survivors slowly start to rebuild

One Kyiv resident in his 30s in the town for the day told Al Majalla that he "would buy a place here, if I could. It would be a great place to get away from the traffic and buzz of Kyiv but close enough to commute to it daily," he noted.

A graveyard where some of the victims were buried in haste and en masse and later dug up near the church has little to show for what happened to hundreds — according to local authorities — here not so long ago, though many foreign dignitaries have come to the place to pay their respects in relative safety in recent months.

A UN report issued in December stated that, "In the town of Bucha near Kyiv, which was under the control of Russian troops from 5 to 30 March, the Mission documented the killing of 73 civilians (54 men, 16 women, 2 boys and 1 girl) and is in the process of corroborating an additional 105 alleged killings."

The Head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, Matilda Bogner, said that, "Russian soldiers brought civilians to makeshift places of detention and then executed them in captivity. Many of the victims' bodies were found with their hands tied behind their backs and gunshot wounds to their heads."

Destroyed Russian tanks and other vehicles still line parts of the road between Bucha and Kyiv, a grim reminder of the proximity of the border with Russia-aligned Belarus.

Russia staged part of its invasion last year from Belarus territory, via the shortest possible land route to Ukraine's capital.

Narrow escape from execution

Less than two weeks after the first Russian soldiers entered the town in late February 2022, Leonid would be arrested and narrowly miss being executed himself.

He pulled out his phone and showed Al Majalla gruesome photos of corpses as well as what he said was a booby-trapped corpse.

When "we received orders to separate males over age 16 from women and children," he said, his voice trailing off. "It was terrible."

"I still look at this photo, often," he said, showing one of male corpses with their hands tied behind their backs, from behind.

"I was arrested with others on 10 March," he said. "These bodies were found on 1 April when the city was liberated. We checked for bodies and we realised that those killed had been in the same situation as we had been."

"I am certain that the main reason we were able to survive was the chaos in the Russian army. Their poor preparation," he said.

He and other men were arrested by one unit and handed over to another, he noted. The second unit "had to leave in the morning and didn't know what to do with us," he claimed.

"When Russians first occupied Bucha, some of the officers thought that they had arrived in Kyiv when they saw high residential buildings, clean streets, McDonalds," he claimed, scoffing with obvious disdain.

"We were lucky, but many were not. The Russians are barbarians. They saw people in good [economic] conditions and they are from poorer areas. They were angry about this. Envious," he claimed.

"They came from Siberia, the far east," he claimed in relation to those who arrested him. "I lived in Russia. I can tell."

Leonid had been born in Bucha but had spent decades in Russia studying and then serving in the Russian forces.

He spent many of his years serving in Russia's eastern region of Khabarovsk, he said, where "Russia also sent many Ukrainian prisoners".

Another image he says he will never forget is that of when the Russians entered Bucha, compared with when they left.

"When they entered the town, they were on top of tanks, looking all around, confident. When they left they were rushing out. Looting anything they could. Blankets, appliances, whatever," he said.

Would-be conquerors that had become lowly thieves, scurrying away, he implied.

"Europeans can visit St. Petersburg and Moscow and see these cities as 'Europe'. But you journalists should understand that there is no Europe in Russian minds," he claimed, his voice rising. "Most Russians are not from these cities."

"You need to understand the way of thinking of Russians that do not live in those two cities," he added, noting that most of those fighting in Ukrainian territory are from the country's more impoverished and outlying regions.

Russia's defence ministry said in a statement issued in April after the initial reports of atrocities committed in Bucha were a "provocation," and that no resident of Bucha suffered violence at the hands of Russian troops.

However, New York Times reporters "spent months in Bucha after Russian forces withdrew, interviewing residents, collecting vast troves of security camera footage and obtaining exclusive records from government sources.

In New York, Times investigators analysed the materials and reconstructed the killings along this one street down to the minute (...) It all points to a brazen and bloody campaign," according to a detailed article published in late December.

The International Criminal Court has opened an investigation into atrocities in Ukraine.

"My brother still lives there [in Russia] but I can't listen to what he says. I don't speak to him anymore. Our parents were here under the bombing and yet he still believes what the Russians claim," Leonid told Al Majalla in the interview in Bucha, angrily.

Angry and possibly scared, as many here are, amid all the attempts to rebuild homes and lives even as battles rage on hundreds of kilometres to the east.