Zelensky calls killings in Bucha 'genocide'

Ukraine's president on Monday urged the world to acknowledge "genocide" at the hands of Russian troops after bodies were discovered in a town outside Kyiv, sparking global outrage.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accuses Russian troops of being behind the killings, but the Kremlin has denied any responsibility and suggested images of corpses were "fakes".

"These are war crimes and it will be recognised by the world as genocide," Zelensky said Monday as he visited the town, where the corpses, some with their hands bound behind their backs, were discovered over the weekend near Kyiv.

US President Joe Biden called for a "war crimes trial" over the alleged atrocities in Bucha and said he would seek "more sanctions" against Moscow, as EU momentum built for a tougher response on top of already unprecedented sanctions against Russia over the war.

European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said the European Union was ready to send a team of investigators to gather evidence of possible war crimes. 

"You stand here today and see what happened. We know that thousands of people have been killed and tortured with extremities cut off, women raped, children killed," he told reporters, wearing a bullet-proof vest for a rare visit outside the Ukrainian capital.

Moscow has called for a UN Security Council meeting on what its deputy ambassador to the body called a "heinous provocation of Ukrainian radicals in Bucha."

"What's happening to Bucha is outrageous and everyone's seen it," Biden said Monday, calling Russian President Vladimir Putin "a war criminal".

"We have to gather all the details" to be able to have a trial, the US president added.

The United States also said it would seek to suspend Russia from the UN Human Rights Council and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said urgent discussions were underway on tougher sanctions against Russia.

The scale of the killings is still being pieced together. On Sunday, Ukrainian prosecutor general Iryna Venediktova said 410 civilian bodies had been recovered in the wider Kyiv region after Russian troops pulled back.

In Bucha, the local mayor said 280 people were buried in mass graves because they could not be buried in cemeteries that were within firing range.