War in Ukraine: In the Kharkov morgue, the bodies of Russian soldiers accumulated

How many soldiers have died since the war began in Ukraine? Kyiv estimates its losses at about 3,000 men, while saying 25,000 Russians died, but Moscow does not provide numbers and speaks of “significant losses”. Ukraine, in any case, has opened the doors of RFI morgue of the country’s second citywhere the corpses of Russian soldiers waiting to be sent to Moscow are piled up.

Upon entering the courtyard of the Kharkov morgue, a pungent odor grips the throat of anyone who enters. The corpses, barely hidden behind the tarpaulinare lined up next to each other on the ground. Men in gowns and gloves were busy as the morgue director welcomed the chroniclers.

Yuri Nikolaevich he was a man of little word, but agreed to show us two bodies with black feet, wearing military uniform, in a separate store: they, he said, Russian soldiers.

body replacement

“These soldiers they have been on the battlefield for over a month, so they are in this state … They will just try. Then we will put them in a cooler place and send them to the Russian Federation, ”he explains.

Nikolaevitch said there was a special group within the Ministry of Defense called ‘Cargo 200’. “They are military, doing the exchange of bodies,” he added.

“We recovered our dead soldiers from the other side of the front in the same way. This is the Geneva Conventions and we respect them. There are no bodies that we keep, as some like to believe, by burying or cremating them ”, he explained.

There are many rumors about the fate of Russian soldiers killed in Ukraine. But hard to know yet. The director also refused to tell us how many of these fighters had been brought to his morgue since the fighting began. On both sides of the front, the number of soldiers killed in battle has always been a sensitive issue.

Russia’s departure outside kyiv, after a month-long first phase of the invasion of Ukraine, has left villages devastated on land and farms along with the remains of Russian soldiers left behind in retreat. .

When Clarion entered the battle zone outside kyiv on the 32nd day of the war, he reported in his records the presence of these bodies now filling the morgues.

“Concrete that in combat zones they are starting to be seen strewn with corpses left there, now being eaten by dogs and starting to rot in the sun,” wrote a special correspondent for this newspaper at the time.

Clarín newsroom with information from Murielle Paradon and Sami Boukhelifa, RFI special envoys in Kharkov

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