I have an open mind on these reports. I cannot say who killed these people, nor in what circumstances they were killed.
But it is certainly true that the Russians have a record of blaming their atrocities on others, with the massacre at Katyn being a prime example, and one the Western Allies went along with in public, even though they knew perfectly well the Soviets had done the killing, not the Nazis. It would hardly be unthinkable an attempt would be made to 'launder' killings done by the secessionists in this manner. It is known for certain there were both killings and 'disappearings' carried out by the secessionists as they established and held their control of these areas. It is worth bearing in mind among the possibilities, until a genuine investigation into the matter is made.
I think a fair portion of the fighters on both sides would probably best be euthanized as a public health measure, but I have seen nothing to indicate the balance swings decisively one way or the other. Not, by the way, that that ought to make much difference in anyone's view of the events in Ukraine in their totality. It is quite possible that the side in the right may be upheld in part by people who are bad indeed; the good cause a bad man fights in does not sanctify him, any more than the presence of a bad man on the line in a good cause puts it in the wrong. Competing claims of atrocity, even when accurate ( and in many cases they are not ), are a poor method of deciding what outcome is best in a conflict. What is wrong in the present situation in the Ukraine is that one country claims to control by right the political and economic life of another, and even a right to seize a portion of its territory, and has used military force to press that claim, first by use of covert operatives and supply of arms and then by use of regular troops in some strength. Russia has no right to dominance in Ukraine, and its insistence at gun-point that it does endangers the settled peace of Europe. That settled peace is something people have come to regard as normal, even natural, but that is far from the case....
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