Russian Investigative Committee head orders investigating all situations of torture of Russian servicemen by Ukrainian troops

MOSCOW. Feb 28 (Interfax) - Russian Investigative Committee head Alexander Bastrykin has demanded opening criminal cases based on situations of torture of Russian servicemen by Ukrainian troops during the Russian special operation in Ukraine, the agency said on its site.

"According to a Russian Defense Ministry report, Ukrainian troops torture captured Russian servicemen. Such actions are a serious violation of international law," the report said.

According to the report, Bastrykin "has ordered investigators from the Main Investigative Directorate of the Russian Investigative Committee to take exhaustive measures to register every fact of torture by Ukrainian troops and thoroughly investigate all circumstances in the criminal cases that have been opened, taking the necessary measures to identify those guilty."

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov earlier told reporters Ukrainian troops tortured Russian soldiers.

"But we know how Ukrainian Nazis are treating the few captured Russian servicemen. And we see the same torture that was perpetrated by German Nazis and their police henchmen in the Great Patriotic War," Konashenkov said.

"All faces, voices, phones and their coordinates, IP addresses, and also correspondence of all Ukrainian Nazis involved in the torture of our fellows are being registered and identified," he said.

"This also applies to the leaders of the Kyiv regime and their perpetrators, who are directly calling for torture of Russian troops in violation of the convention on the treatment of prisoners-of-war," Konashenkov said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin declared the start of a special military operation in Ukraine on February 24.