Moscow on Friday accused Ukrainian troops of killing 22 people in an occupied Russian village, including eight women who were allegedly raped before being executed.

Ukraine controls dozens of border settlements in the Kursk region of western Russia since launching a surprise offensive in August and says about 2,000 civilians still live in areas it occupies.

Russia has now retaken several towns.

Russia’s Investigative Committee had said on January 19 it was investigating the killing of “at least seven civilians” in the village of Russkoye Porechnoye, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) from the Ukrainian border.

On Friday, it said it was now investigating the killing of “22 residents” between September and November.

Among the victims, whose bodies were found in the basements of several homes, were eight women who were allegedly raped before being killed, the Investigative Committee said.

AFP was not immediately able to verify the claims and there has been no official response from Ukraine.

Russian investigators blame five Ukrainian soldiers for the killings and said one of them, Yevgeny Fabrisenko, was arrested during the fighting in the Kursk region.

The committee released a video of the interrogation of a man identified as Fabrisenko, who confessed.

At a briefing on Friday, Russia’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said: “First people were tortured, abused, then killed either by being shot or blown up.”

Russia and Ukraine have accused each other of killing civilians since the conflict began nearly three years ago.

Russian forces are accused of murdering hundreds of civilians in the town of Bucha, near Kyiv. AFP journalists are among the international media outlets that have seen and photographed the bodies of Ukrainian civilians killed, some with their hands tied.

Moscow has denied the allegations and accused Kyiv of staging the footage — a claim that has been rejected by several independent fact-checking organisations and media outlets, including AFP.