Comment by nradov

Most of the dead were legally citizens of the Russian Federation, but not what the leadership would really consider "Russian". To them, only people in the core Moscow - St. Petersburg region really count. Others are expendable. They may even see it as a net positive to purge some of population from the outer provinces: drunkards, unemployed, criminals, members of ethnic minorities, etc. (To be clear I don't support the Russian invasion of Ukraine, just explaining what Putin and his key supporters seem to be thinking.)