Volodymyr Zelenskyy to address UN Security Council on Tuesday

Ukrainian president says there may be more mass civilian casualties in other occupied towns

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in his video address from Kyiv on April 3. AP

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Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he would address the UN Security Council on Tuesday and predicted worse cases of mass civilian killings by Russian troops would be found.

Tuesday's Security Council session is to consider Ukrainian allegations of civilian murders by Russian troops in Bucha, north-west of Kyiv, after the discovery of hundreds of bodies, some bound and shot at close range.

Russia has categorically denied the accusations, calling them "criminal provocations", and says it will present "empirical evidence" to the Security Council that its forces have not been involved in atrocities.

Mr Zelenskyy has already spoken by video link to more than a dozen assemblies, including the US Congress and the British and European parliaments.

"I would like to emphasise that we are interested in the most complete, transparent investigation, the results of which will be known and explained to the entire international community," he said in his nightly video address early on Tuesday.

In Bucha, where mass graves and bodies were found after Ukraine took the town back from Russian forces, at least 300 civilians had been killed, Mr Zelenskyy said.

"And this is only one town, one of many Ukrainian communities which the Russian forces managed to capture," he said.

"Now, there is information that in Borodyanka and some other liberated Ukrainian towns, the number of casualties of the occupiers may be even much higher."

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  In the courtyard of their house, Vlad Tanyuk, 6, stands near the grave of his mother Ira Tanyuk, who died because of starvation and stress due to the war, on the outskirts of Kyiv. AP

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  A Ukrainian soldier walks with children passing destroyed cars due to the war against Russia, in Bucha, on the outskirts of Kyiv, Ukraine. AP

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  President Volodymyr Zelenskyy surveys the destruction in Bucha. AFP

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  Residential buildings damaged during fighting in the southern port city of Mariupol. Reuters

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  A bridge damaged by shelling in Bucha. EPA

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  A soldier stationed in Bucha, after the city was the recaptured by the Ukrainian army. EPA

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  Chervona Voloshin kisses Varvara Statenova goodbye as she heads home to Kyiv after being housed at a shelter for displaced people in Lviv, Ukraine. Getty Images

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  Parts of a destroyed aircraft at the Antonov airport in Hostomel, outskirts of Kyiv. AP

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  A Ukrainian territorial defence serviceman walks past a destroyed Russian armoured personnel carrier in the town of Borodianka, north-west of Kyiv. AFP

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  Tanya Nedashkivska recounts how her husband Vasyl Ivanovych, who served in Ukraine’s navy, was killed by Russian soldiers, in Bucha, Ukraine. He was arrested by Russian soldiers. Tanya looked for him for days and found him in a building's basement where two bodies were lying. She recognised him by his shoes and trousers. AP

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  Damaged residential buildings in the southern port city of Mariupol. Reuters

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  Families arrive to board a train at Kramatorsk central station as they flee the eastern city, in the Donbas region. AFP

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  Romanian politicians listen to President Zelenskyy’s speech by video link, on a screen in the parliament in Bucharest. AP

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  The remains of a Russian Su-35 aircraft that was hit by the Ukrainian armed forces in Kharkiv. Reuters

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  A damaged monument to Ukrainian poet Taras Shevchenko in the besieged city of Mariupol, southern Ukraine. Reuters

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  A man removes a door covering the opening to an underground concrete enclosure in which bodies of civilians killed by Russian forces, residents say, were dumped as people were unable to transport them to a cemetery in Bucha, Ukraine. AP

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  A Ukrainian soldier tries to convince a puppy to drink milk as residents wait for distribution of food products in Motyzhyn, Ukraine, which was until recently under the control of the Russian military. AP

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  The pain of war is evident as women wait for food aid in the village of Motyzhyn. AP

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  Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy appears on screen during the 64th Grammy Awards at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. AFP

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  The gutted interior of a theatre in central Mariupol, destroyed in the course of Ukraine-Russia conflict. Reuters

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  Desolation in Mariupol which has suffered intense bombardment. Reuters

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  A Ukrainian soldier walks in front of the remains of an Antonov An-225 Mriya cargo plane, the world's biggest aircraft, destroyed by Russian troops at an airfield in the city of Hostomel, in the Kyiv region. Reuters

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  A local woman salutes Ukrainian soldiers in the Chernihiv region. Reuters

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  A woman hugs a Ukrainian soldier after a convoy of military and aid vehicles arrived in the formerly Russian-occupied town of Bucha, near Kyiv. AP

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  Smoke rises after an attack by Russian forces in Odesa. AFP

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  Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskyy presents an award to an injured Ukrainian service member at a military hospital in Kyiv. Reuters

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  A destroyed building in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv. AFP

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  People, mainly women and children, pass through the Medyka border crossing on their journey out of Ukraine and into Poland. Getty

Ukrainian authorities say they have restored control over all of Kyiv region and other districts after Russia announced it had shifted its aims away from Kyiv and Chernihiv in the north to secure control over the entire eastern Donbas region.

Around Kyiv, Chernihiv and Sumy regions further north and east, "the occupiers did something that the locals did not even witness during the Nazi occupation 80 years ago", Mr Zelenskyy said.

It was in Ukraine's interests to have "thousands of journalists there. As much as possible. Let the world see what Russia has done", he said.

Mr Zelenskyy said Russian forces did not conceal what happened in Bucha but could do so in other places they had occupied.