The number of burials is growing in Ukraine’s Mariupol — over 1,500 new graves have been dug in the city since the beginning of summer, the BBC reports, citing satellite images.
The images captured burials in the settlements of Staryi Krym, Manhush, and Vynohradne near Mariupol. They were analysed by the Centre for Information Resilience for the BBC. The researchers concluded that more than 1,500 new graves have been dug in the Mariupol district since June.
In total, over 4,600 graves have appeared since the start of the war, the journalists clarify. Furthermore, it is impossible to confirm how many bodies are buried in them.
Ukrainian authorities believe that at least 25,000 people were killed in the battle for Mariupol, among them 5,000-7,000 people that died under the rubble of the buildings destroyed in the bombings. Before the war, Mariupol’s population counted around 500,000 people.
The Ukrainian side has been regularly reporting new burial sites found in the places liberated from Russian forces. The last statement of the kind was made on 30 October: head of the Donetsk region military administration Pavlo Kyrylenko said that five burial sites had been discovered on the territories of the Donetsk region previously occupied by Russian troops.
