A heartbroken father has been pictured showing his son’s blood on his hands to a captured Russian soldier after his 15-year-old child was killed by Russian shelling as the family tried to evacuate animals from a local zoo.

Vitalii Seleveni, stricken with grief, thrust his hands under the nose of the Russian soldier to show him the blood of his son Dennis, moments after learning that the boy had died.

Dennis, a volunteer at the zoo, had been trying to evacuate a herd of buffaloes from the Feldman Ecopark in Kharkiv with his parents and other team members when they came under fire on Thursday.

The 15-year-old was rushed to a local hospital, his body blooded from the shrapnel. His mother frantically followed him on a stretcher, her face etched with concern, as he was led into the emergency room.