The Canadian House of Commons said on Wednesday that war crimes by Russia included mass atrocities, systematic instances of willful killing of Ukrainian civilians, desecration of corpses, forcible transfer of Ukrainian children, torture, physical harm, mental harm, and rape, the Reuters news agency reported.
It quoted Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as saying earlier this month that it was "absolutely right" for people to describe Russia's actions in Ukraine as genocide.
US President Joe Biden a day earlier described Russia's actions in Ukraine as amounting to genocide, according to Reuters.
Meanwhile, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Thursday visited the town of Borodyanka in Ukraine's Kyiv region, saying that "there is no way the war can be acceptable in the 21st century."
Guterres in early April called for an investigation into civilian deaths in the nearby town of Bucha, where mass graves were discovered after the withdrawal of Russian troops from northern Ukraine.
The top war crimes prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (ICC), Karim Khan, has said that Ukraine has become "a crime scene" amid Russia's brutal invasion of the country.
Polish President Andrzej Duda said on a visit to Kyiv in mid-April with his Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian counterparts that “those responsible for crimes against the Ukrainian people must be punished by international tribunals.”
He appealed for “sanctions that will exclude Russia” from the international community.
Poland’s upper-house Speaker, Tomasz Grodzki, said after returning from Kyiv two days later that "the Russian devastation of Ukraine" and atrocities committed there were "much more terrible" than he and others could have imagined before visiting the war-torn country.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said in early April that Russian war crimes in Ukraine were “the darkest chapter in the history of 21st-century Europe” and urged an international inquiry into the atrocities.
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Source: Reuters, PAP