Russian Tank Shoots Dead Volunteers Feeding Starving Animals In Kyiv

A Russian military vehicle fatally shot three Ukrainian volunteers who had just delivered food to starving animals in the largely Russian-occupied city of Bucha, according to reports.

Serhiy Ustymenko, 25, Anastasia Yalanska, 26, and Maxym Kuzmenko, 28, were approaching home in an SUV Friday when a Russian vehicle — described by witnesses as either a tank or an infantry fighting vehicle (IFV) — opened fire on them, The Kyiv Independent reported.

The three were on their way to pick up Ustymenko's parents after delivering dog food to a shelter that had run out of supplies, according to the outlet.

Valeriy Ustymenko, Serhiy's father, ran to the SUV after the shooting, but everyone inside was dead.

He dragged out the three bodies and took them to his basement, where he — like most people in Bucha — has been hiding from the constant shelling.

The bodies were still in the basement with Valeriy three days after the incident as they could not be buried due to the artillery fire.

Serhiy was the co-founder of a car repair shop in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, while Yalanska was an IT recruiter and Kuzmenko a hookah server.

It was unlikely for Russian soldiers to not have known that they were shooting civilians, the victims' friends said.

"The car was (obviously) civilian. Maxym was wearing a hat with a pom-pom. They didn’t look like the military at all," Dmytro Zubkov, a friend of Kuzmenko, was quoted as saying.

At least 406 civilians in Ukraine have died and 801 more have been injured due to Russia's invasion, the United Nations confirmed Monday.

Russia has claimed that its military does not deliberately target civilians in its invasion of Ukraine, but "very credible" evidence suggested otherwise, according to U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

Russian forces bombarded an intersection on a road in northern Ukraine that was being used by hundreds of civilians to flee, the Human Rights Watch said in a report.

At least eight civilians died from the attack, according to the Ukrainian government.

Several people have been killed in separate incidents after Russian soldiers reportedly opened fire on two civilian vehicles in Ukraine in recent days.

The first vehicle, which allegedly contained an elderly couple, was traveling through the town of Makariv when a Russian BMP IFV destroyed it with its heavy caliber gun, supposed footage of the incident showed.

Russian forces were also allegedly responsible for shooting at a minibus that was marked with a red cross in the city of Mykolaiv.

The shooting resulted in three teachers dying and two other people getting injured.