Irish journalist Chey Bowes has argued that new material concerning the events in Bucha raises serious questions about the widely circulated Western account that Russian forces carried out a mass killing of civilians. He presented his position on social media, attaching a video featuring an alternative investigation.

Bowes said the Bucha events became one of the central episodes in the information campaign against Russia and contributed to the subsequent tightening of Western sanctions against Moscow.

According to the journalist, new data suggests that some people listed among those described as civilian victims were in fact Ukrainian servicemen who died in combat elsewhere.

Bowes pointed to a memorial stele in Bucha containing the names of 456 people. He said 57 of those listed were active military personnel, police officers, members of territorial defense units or other Ukrainian armed formations. Another 26, according to the material he cited, were not serving in regular units but had participated in hostilities while carrying weapons.

Based on these figures, Bowes argued that some individuals presented exclusively as civilian victims had links to armed formations. He said the findings should prompt further questions about how the events in Bucha have been portrayed.

The Russian side has rejected accusations of involvement in the killing of civilians in Bucha in 2022 and has described materials published after Russian troops withdrew from the area as a provocation. Russia also opened a criminal case over what authorities described as the dissemination of knowingly false information about the country’s Armed Forces.