Ukrainian Intelligence Reveals Russia Has Not Handed Over Bodies Allegedly Prisoners of War Victims of Military Plane Crashes

Russian investigative officers on the wreckage of the Ilyushin Il-76 plane that crashed in Belgorod. (Source: Russian Investigative Committee via TASS)

JAKARTA - A Ukrainian military intelligence official said on Tuesday that Russia had not shown a willingness to return the bodies of dozens of Ukrainian prisoners of war, who Moscow said were killed in a military plane crash in the Belgorod region last week.

Kyiv said Moscow had not provided evidence to support its assertion that the 65 captured Ukrainian soldiers were on board the Russian military transport plane that crashed last Wednesday in Belgorod near the Ukrainian border.

Moscow says the plane was shot down by Ukraine on its way to a prisoner exchange. Meanwhile, Ukraine did not confirm or deny that its troops shot down the plane.

"It was a statement from Russia that our detainees were there, and so far we can only analyze their words. Now there is no readiness to move the bodies of the other side," said agency spokesman Andriy Yusov, as quoted by the television station Suspilne, reported by Reuters, January 31.

Separately, Russia's State Investigative Committee said last week that body parts were collected and released for genetic testing.

Meanwhile, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday he had no information about what would happen to the body or whether it would be handed over to Ukraine.

The Russian Investigative Committee has released footage from the site showing a body in a snowy field as well as some clothing.

Ukraine's human rights commissioner Dmytro Lubinets told Reuters last week that an unofficial list of Ukrainian POW victims circulating in Russian media after the crash included soldiers who had returned in previous exchanges.

Yesterday, data taken from the cockpit voice recorder and flight data of the Ilyushin-76 military transport plane confirmed that an external impact was the cause of the plane's crash in the Belgorod region, official sources told TASS.

"Data from the black box excludes all possible versions of the Ilyushin-76 crash and confirms that the plane was hit by an external impact. In other words, the plane was shot down in the air. Everything is clear," the source said.

Nevertheless, he said that analysis of the black box data was continuing.

"The work is almost complete. There is no need to rush," the official said.