KIEV, September 30. /ITAR-TASS/. Kiev will carry out an investigation into all cases of mass burial sites in Donbass, Ukrainian Foreign Ministry spokesman Yevgeny Perebeinos said on Tuesday.

“All cases of mass graves must and will be thoroughly investigated as soon as we receive unhampered access to the sites where they have been found,” Perebeinos said.

Ukraine “is ready to cooperate with our partners, including with the OSCE”, he added.

At the same time, Perebeinos described Ukrainian servicemen’s involvement in mass graves as “unfounded provocation”.

Mass graves in eastern Ukraine

On September 23, reports came that Ukrainian people’s militia found mass burials in the area of mine No 22 “Kommunar” outside Donetsk in eastern Ukraine. Medical examiners made a conclusion that the bodies found in one of the graves were killed by point-blank shots in the head.

This area was previously controlled by the Ukrainian security forces and fighters of the Aidar battalion of the National Guard. The whole area will be examined. The militias say they found other graves that have not been opened up.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry believes the mass burial of civilians near Donetsk is a military crime that could have been committed by Ukraine’s National Guard, and insists on an urgent and comprehensive international probe into the case. Kiev has rejected the claims.

Russia’s Investigative Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said the Investigation Committee planned to launch an inquiry into the discovered mass burial of civilians near Donetsk as part of the criminal case into the war in southeastern Ukraine.

“The reports of killings of people, whose bodies were found in a mass burial near Donetsk, are to be verified by the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee in the framework of the investigation of the criminal case into the use of banned means and methods of warfare against civilians in south-eastern Ukraine,” Markin said.