New Delhi: Ukraine's prosecutor general, Iryna Venediktova, on Sunday announced that 410 civilian corpses have been retrieved from areas recently retaken from the Russian army in the greater Kyiv region.
"410 bodies of dead civilians were evacuated out of the liberated territories of the Kyiv region. Forensic experts have already examined 140," Venediktova informed national television, news agency AFP reported.
Ukraine, which retook control of the whole Kyiv region from the Russian army last weekend, has accused Moscow of carrying out a "deliberate slaughter" in Bucha, 30 kilometres (19 miles) northwest of the city.
Anatoly Fedoruk, the mayor of Bucha, told AFP on Saturday that 280 victims had been buried in mass graves.
Civilian dead were also discovered in the streets after Ukrainian forces reclaimed control of the town.
At least 20 dead were discovered on a single street in Bucha on Saturday, according to AFP journalists. One of the men had his arms bound behind his back. They were all dressed in civilian clothes.
On Sunday, local officials showed AFP a mass grave in town, where some of the remains were still not buried, and said 57 people were buried there.
Russia has denied killing civilians, calling the allegations "another invention of the Kyiv administration and the Western media."
"During the time this settlement was under the control of Russian armed forces, not a single local resident suffered from any violent actions," Moscow's defence ministry said Sunday.
The Russian army took Bucha three days after President Vladimir Putin started his attack on February 24.
Ukraine has also accused Russia of murdering people in the adjacent town of Irpin, which, like Bucha, has been devastated.
Since Moscow started its onslaught, at least 200 people have been slain in Irpin, which also fell to the Russian army in the early days of the war.
(With AFP Inputs)