More than 600 bodies exhumed in Kharkiv region territories liberated from Russians

"In fact, we have already exhumed more than 600 bodies of the dead in Kharkiv region. We cannot identify them immediately, there is a problem. In particular, identification is made through DNA analysis, special laboratories work here. Yes, our international partners helped us so that it could be done quickly, but we understand that this work takes weeks, sometimes months, to establish who exactly was tortured," Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Denys Monastyrsky said during the nationwide news telethon, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

Monastyrsky clarified that the relatives address the law enforcement officers in this matter, DNA samples are taken, compared, and the police can establish the identity of a tortured person within a certain period of time.

The minister also informed that the Verkhovna Rada had passed a special law on DNA which would clearly simplify the procedure for identifying the bodies of the dead.

"And in general, of course, we understand that every moment we get closer to victory also reveals new war crimes committed by the occupiers," the official said.

Monastyrsky noted that the law enforcement officers faced approximately the same thing in every territory freed from the Russian Federation, namely the torture chambers left by the Russians.

"In the basements [of some buildings], they tortured people, bodies were taken out of the settlement. We unearth mass graves in almost every settlement," he said.

The minister expressed his belief that the world should know about what was happening in the territories occupied by Russia. "We understand that any occupied territory means dozens of tortured civilians, prisoners, our Ukrainian military, this is what we deal with every day," he said.

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