Ukraine claims ‘mini Auschwitz’ discovered in town newly liberated from Russian forces
A suspected Russian torture chamber – dubbed a “mini Auschwitz” – has been discovered in a newly-liberated town, Ukrainian officials have claimed.
The room, which contained a box of gold dental crowns, was found inside a de-occupied town near Izyum, a city in the eastern Kharkiv region of Ukraine.
Having been occupied by Russian forces since April, Pisky-Radkivski was freed by Ukrainian troops last week.
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As they moved through the region, local officials and National Police said they made the grim discovery in the Borova district, alongside several other horrendous items.
A gas mask with a dirty cloth attached to it was found, Kharkiv’s chief police investigator said, with Ukraine’s defence ministry claiming it had been forced onto “the head of a victim, who was covered with a smouldering rag and buried alive”.
The box of gold dental crowns that was found prompted the ministry to draw parallels between Russian and Nazi forces, describing the room as a “mini Auschwitz”.
The Nazi concentration camp, where an estimated 1.1 million people were killed, saw more than 40kg of gold and white metal from false teeth removed from the bodies of victims murdered in gas chambers, according to the Auschwitz Memorial.
Photos released by the head of Kharkiv’s National Security Service’s investigative department, Serhii Bolvinov, also showed a smashed phone, pieces of what appeared to be barbed wire, and a sex toy.
“Neighbours constantly heard screams from there. Investigators found a terrible torture chamber in the village,” he said.
He confirmed that police “know the names of the victims” and an investigation is now underway.
A gas mask with a cloth attached to it was found in Pisky-Radkivski. Pic: Head of the investigative department of the National Security Service in the Kharkiv region
‘People were intimidated, beaten and abused’
The country’s National Police Force has accused Russian troops of committing war crimes during their occupation of the area.
“When Russian servicemen entered the village, they drove the locals out of their homes and settled there themselves,” it said.
“People were intimidated, beaten and abused. The Russian occupiers left looted houses. Dirt and filth – the trademark of the ‘Russian world’,” it added.
Pic: Head of the investigative department of the National Security Service in the Kharkiv region
Inside the alleged ‘torture chamber’. Pic:National Police of Ukraine
‘Mass burial sites’ previously found in Izyum
This is not the first time Russian forces have been accused of committing war crimes during the war in Ukraine, with tens of thousands of alleged incidents currently being investigated by police.
The United Nations human rights office has said Russia’s invasion has caused a dire human rights situation in the country, and a wide range of violations, including extrajudicial killings and torture, that could amount to war crimes have been committed.
A war crime is defined by the United Nations as a serious breach of international humanitarian law committed against civilians or “enemy combatants” during an armed conflict.
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Izyum dead ‘show signs of torture’
Russia has already been accused of war crimes in Izyum, following the discovery of more than 440 graves in the town earlier in the conflict.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said a “mass burial site” was found in September.
Mr Bolvinov claimed that some of the victims were “shot dead”, with others died as a result of artillery fire, mine explosions, and airstrikes.
Graves in Izyum
Bodies found with their hands tied behind their backs
One of the most notable alleged war crime incidents to have taken place in Ukraine was in the town of Bucha, where dead bodies were found with their hands tied behind their backs.
Just outside the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, the area was devastated by fighting, and after Russian troops began to withdraw, images revealed a 45ft-long makeshift mass grave outside a church.
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Bodies still being found in Bucha
Sky News verified two videos showing bodies laying in the street, including one with at least seven corpses on the pavement.
Photos taken by Associated Press showed bodies of people dressed in civilian clothes with their hands tied behind their backs and wounds to the back of their heads, with a suggestion that some were shot at close range.
The images prompted condemnation and offers of more support to Ukraine from across the world, including the UK and the United States.
Russia has repeatedly denied committing any war crimes.
A famine has been declared in Gaza City and the surrounding neighbourhoods.
The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) – a globally recognised system for classifying the severity of food insecurity and malnutrition – has confirmed just four famines since it was established in 2004.
These were in Somalia in 2011, and in Sudan in 2017, 2020, and 2024.
The confirmation of famine in Gaza City is the IPC’s first outside of Africa.
“After 22 months of relentless conflict, over half a million people in the Gaza Strip are facing catastrophic conditions characterised by starvation, destitution and death,” the report said, adding that more than a million other people face a severe level of food insecurity.
Israel Gaza map
Over the next month conditions are also expected to worsen, with the famine projected to expand to Deir al-Balah and Khan Younis, the report said.
Nearly a third of the population (641,000 people) are expected to face catastrophic conditions while acute malnutrition is projected to continue getting worse rapidly.
Over the next year, the report said at least 132,000 children will suffer from acute malnutrition – double the organisation’s estimates from May 2024.
Israel says no famine in Gaza
Volker Turk, the UN Human Rights chief, said the famine is the direct result of actions taken by the Israeli government.
“It is a war crime to use starvation as method of warfare, and the resulting deaths may also amount to the war crime of wilful killing,” he said.
COGAT, the Israeli military agency that coordinates aid, has rejected the findings.
Israel’s foreign ministry said there is no famine in Gaza: “Over 100,000 trucks of aid have entered Gaza since the start of the war, and in recent weeks a massive influx of aid has flooded the Strip with staple foods and caused a sharp decline in food prices, which have plummeted in the markets.”
Another UN chief made a desperate plea to Israel’s prime minister to declare a ceasefire in the wake of the famine announcement.
Tom Fletcher, UN under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs, said famine could have been prevented in the strip if there hadn’t been a “systematic obstruction” of aid deliveries.
“My ask, my plea, my demand to Prime Minister Netanyahu and anyone who can reach him. Enough. Ceasefire. Open the crossings, north and south, all of them,” he said.
The IPC had previously warned famine was imminent in parts of Gaza, but had stopped short of a formal declaration.
Palestinians struggle to get aid at a community kitchen in Gaza City. Pic: AP
The latest report on Gaza from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) says there were almost 13,000 new admissions of children for acute malnutrition recorded in July.
The latest numbers from the Gaza health ministry are 251 dead as a result of famine and malnutrition, including 108 children.
But Israel has previously accused Hamas of inflating these figures, saying that most of the children who died had pre-existing health conditions.
The Ukrainian suspected of coordinating attacks on the Nord Stream pipelines had served in Ukraine’s Secret Service and in the Ukrainian Army’s special forces, Sky News understand.
Serhii K., 49, was arrested in northern Italy on Thursday following the issuance of a European arrest warrant by German prosecutors.
It is not known whether he was still serving at the time of the pipeline attack in 2022 and Ukraine’s government has always denied any involvement in the explosions.
According to sources close to the case, the suspect has been found in a three-star bungalow hotel named La Pescaccia in San Clemente, in the province of Rimini.
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Man arrested over Nord Stream attacks
When military officers from Italy’s Carabinieri investigative and operational units raided his bedroom, he didn’t try to resist the arrest.
The hotel’s employees have been questioned, but no further evidence or any weapons were found, the sources added.
Serhii arrived on Italy’s Adriatic coast earlier this week, and the purpose of his trip was a holiday. He was found with his two children and his wife.
At least one of the four people within his family had a travel ticket issued in Poland. He crossed the Italian border with his car with a Ukrainian license plate last Tuesday.
He was travelling with his passport, and he used his real identity to check into the hotel, triggering an emergency alert on a police server, we have been told.
A satellite image shows gas from the Nord Stream pipeline bubbling up in the Baltic Sea. File pic: Roscosmos via Reuters
After the arrest, he was taken to the Rimini police station before being moved to a prison in Bologna, the regional capital, on Friday.
Deputy Bologna Prosecutor Licia Scagliarini has granted the German judicial authorities’ requests for Serhii’s surrender, but Sky News understands the man told the appeal court that he doesn’t consent to being handed over to Germany.
He also denied the charges and said he was in Ukraine during the Nord Stream sabotage. He added that he is currently in Italy for family reasons.
While leaving the court, he was seen making a typical Ukrainian nationalist ‘trident’ gesture to the reporters.
The next hearing is scheduled for 3 September, when the Bologna appeal court is set to decide whether Serhii will be extradited to Germany or not. He will remain in jail until then.
In Germany, he will face charges of collusion to cause an explosion, anti-constitutional sabotage and the destruction of structures.
German prosecutors believe he was part of a group of people who planted devices on the pipelines near the Danish island of Bornholm in September 2022.
Serhii and his accomplices are believed to have set off from Rostock on Germany’s north-eastern coast in a sailing yacht to carry out the attack.
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The explosions severely damaged three pipelines transporting gas from Russia to Europe. It represented a significant escalation in the Ukraine conflict and worsening of the continent’s energy supply crisis.
According to a US intelligence report leaked in 2023, a pro-Ukraine group was behind the attack. Yet, no group has ever claimed responsibility.
Spare pipes for the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline. File pic: Reuters/Fabian Bimmer
Sky News understands Genoa’s Prosecutor’s Office in northern Italy has requested their colleagues in Bologna to share the information related to Serhii.
Anti-terrorism prosecutors are investigating another alleged sabotage linked to the Russian shadow fleet oil tanker Seajewel, which sank off the port of Savona last February.
On Thursday, they asked an investigative police unit to figure out whether there is a link between that episode and the Nord Stream attacks.
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