Two outlets say captured National Guardsmen were 'executed' near Dobropillia; Suspilne says Defence Forces soldiers were 'shot'

What we hold. Three Ukrainian-language reports, published on 11 September within seven minutes of each other. All three say Russian troops killed two captured Ukrainian soldiers near Dobropillia. Suspilne names the Donetsk regional prosecutor's office as its source. Censor.NET's headline credits "the prosecutor's office". Ukrainska Pravda's opening lines name no source.

Where they differ.

"Defence Forces" includes the National Guard. It does not confirm the unit.

The case. Censor.NET and Ukrainska Pravda say prosecutors have opened a pre-trial investigation into a war crime. Censor.NET gives the article: part 2 of Article 438 of Ukraine's Criminal Code.

What is not settled.

• Who the two soldiers were. No report names them.
• When they were killed. No report gives a date or time for the killing.
• How the prosecutor knows. No report says.
• What Russia says. We hold no Russian response and no Russian-language report.
• Whether there is a second source. All three rest on one announcement. Three reports are one account, not three confirmations.
• What the full articles say. We hold only their opening lines.

What this is about. A prosecutor in eastern Ukraine says Russian troops killed two Ukrainian soldiers who had already been captured, and has opened a war-crimes investigation into it.

How it got here. Russia and Ukraine have been at war since Russia invaded on 24 February 2022. That invasion followed eight years of a smaller war: Russia annexed Crimea in March 2014, and fighting began the same year in the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed armed groups. Donetsk region has been the main axis of the Russian advance since 2022. Dobropillia is a town in that region, near the fighting.

Killing a soldier who has surrendered is treated differently in law from killing one still fighting. The Third Geneva Convention of 1949, which both Russia and Ukraine have ratified, protects prisoners of war from violence from the moment they are taken. Ukraine carries that into its own law as Article 438 of its Criminal Code — violation of the laws and customs of war — and prosecutes such cases itself, through regional prosecutors' offices, of which Donetsk's is one. A pre-trial investigation is the opening stage: it establishes what happened before anyone is charged. Ukraine also joined the International Criminal Court, whose ratification took effect on 1 January 2025; Russia is not a member and does not hand over its own nationals.

Who is in it. The National Guard of Ukraine is a separate armed force under the Interior Ministry that fights alongside the army. "Defence Forces of Ukraine" is the umbrella term covering both. That is why the two labels in these reports do not contradict each other — and why neither settles the unit.

What is at stake. Almost all such cases are built against soldiers the Ukrainian state cannot reach, so the record itself is the product. Whether the two men are ever named, and on what evidence, decides what that record is worth.

Where it stands. An investigation announced on 11 September. We hold no Russian account of it.