The world has been appalled by the images of dead bodies in the streets.
Multiple witnesses say they were the victims of Russian soldiers who beat, tortured, and executed scores of civilians when they took control of the town in early March.
Russia has denied the accusations, with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov describing them as fake.
Joe Ondrak, lead investigator at Logically Artificial, told Insider that Russia was trying to portray the killings of the Bucha people as a hoax, while also blaming Ukraine for the deaths there.
The mainstream media will not report on the atrocities committed by the neo-Nazis and the Ukrainian forces against civilians in Bucha because of discussions on pro-Russian Telegram channels.
Western media has extensively reported the atrocities, but has attributed responsibility to Russia, based on evidence from the scene.
In a Telegram post, the Russian foreign ministry claimed that its forces left the town on March 30. They cannot have killed the civilians on this date.
They said there was no evidence before April 4. The bodies were not in a state of decomposition that was consistent with being killed during the Russian occupation.
Givi Gigitashvili, who analyses Russian misinformation for the Atlantic Council, said there is mounting evidence to undermine Russia's argument.
He told Insider that Russia has used similar propaganda before.
He said that the claims tend to appeal to a Western conspiracist audience when the Kremlin doesn't like facts.
The report in Zvezda TV, a news outlet run by the Russian ministry of defense, is contrary to the claim that Russia withdrew its forces on March 30.
Zvezda reported that it was conducting clean up operations in Bucha on April 1. Ukrainian authorities said the town was under Russian control.
The atrocities began to emerge as early as April 1 when Ukrainian forces entered the town.
There were shocking videos on Ukrainian Telegram channels showing bodies lying on the street. The New York Times reported that the footage was taken by a council member.
The bodies were already present when Ukrainian forces entered the town, which undermines the Russian claim that there was no evidence of atrocities before April 3.
Russia tried to undermine the video by suggesting that the people were still alive.
The movement can be seen to be a mark on a window, as noted by open-source analysts at Bellingcat.
—Bellingcat (@bellingcat) April 4, 2022
Russia has tried to portray the fact that images began to emerge from Bucha only after Ukrainian forces retook the town as suspicious, claiming it was only on the fourth day after Russian forces left.
After Ukrainian forces regained control of the town, they had to conduct extensive operations to make it safe.
Most journalists and officials were able to enter the town on April 3. Not all.
The first images of the bodies lying in the streets were taken by journalists from Agence France-Presse on Saturday, April 2, while the security operation was underway.
—AFP News Agency (@AFP) April 2, 2022
Satellite footage from Maxar Technologies was published by The New York Times and shows bodies lying in the street.
Russia was in control of the town. The positions of the bodies in the images are related to the positions of bodies in photographs and film footage.
Russia claims that the images of the bodies show that rigor mortis, or a stiffening of the muscles after death, has not set in, meaning they could not have been killed while its forces were in the town.
The state of the bodies is consistent with being killed during the Russian occupation, according to a pathologist who has investigated war crimes.
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