Russian War Crimes in Ukraine

 

"We’re literally training kids how to put on tourniquets because enough people wanted the rest of their family to know how to take care of them in case they were injured, or their kid was the only one left alive in a building."

"These people feel like they’re facing an existential threat, and they want something better for their kids — they want their kids to survive."

"[Now, though], frostbite, or cold, or malnutrition, or even just GI [gastrointestinal] related illness that goes prolonged and untreated [are becoming more common, likely due to lapses in critical infrastructure," 

"Before Russia ramped up the attacks on civilian infrastructure], we would see military-aged males, injured in combat with blast and shrapnel injuries. You would occasionally see the civilian population — the usual spread, women, children, and elderly — that may have gotten hit with just a missile, or something that hit a civilian area. Or, if it was a town that was being attacked by the Russians and they were trying to obliterate everything within the town, then it was just a spread of everybody coming in with blast and shrapnel and burn injuries."

"I think we’re starting to see a much larger scale of problems from a health standpoint that may not be a direct blast, penetrating injuries, burn injuries — it’s now population-wide in terms of loss of infrastructure problems, so I think that’s the more noticeable impact of what’s been going on lately."

"[Many victims now look like] the elderly grandmother who’s sitting in her apartment, just trying to wait out the war [and] suddenly has no power for a week, or suddenly has no clean water."

Aaron Epstein, the president of the Global Surgical and Medical Support Group 

 

"The subject matter [and] technical expertise leaves [so there’s no one to repair the damaged infrastructure. Ukrainian cities have demonstrated quite a bit of resilience so far, repairing damaged facilities and restoring access to critical services as quickly as possible], but as this goes on it will be interesting to see what continuing toll is going to be on the response."

"Critical infrastructure or civilian objects should not be targeted under the law of armed conflict, under IHL [But services and facilities that civilians rely on — like a power station] can be dual-use, they can be used by the military and then they could qualify as a military objective under IHL because by their nature and location, they’re making a contribution to military action.”

"[Military actors] should not be trying to degrade critical infrastructure, unless that’s part of your war strategy, [but if that’s the case], you run afoul of the legal principles."

Sahr Muhammadally, director for MENA & South Asia at Center for Civilians in Conflict

Ukrainian civilians queue for humanitarian aid provided by the Red Cross as people try to survive amid the wave of Russia’s missile strikes in Sviatohiersk, Donetsk Oblast, Ukraine on October 20, 2022.

Wolfgang Schwan/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

 

Now that it has become clear that Vladimir Putin's military strategy to bring Ukraine to its knees -- while the Ukrainian military has been ousting Russian troops from occupied territories and is fast moving in on Kherson -- by continuing and intensifying its illegal aerial bombardments of the country's critical infrastructure; its power stations, electrical grids, potable water supply, bombing civilian targets, destroying areas right across the vast geography of Ukraine -- there are new warnings that a massive dam may be the next target.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy once again is calling on the West, this time to address Russia directly about the severe inadvisability of blowing up the immense Nova Kakhovka dam holding back a reservoir dominating much of southern Ukraine. Russian forces have performed the prelininary work in planting explosives within the dam. "Now everyone in the world must act powerfully and quickly to prevent a new Russian terrorist attack. Destroying the dam would mean a large-scale disaster", Mr.Zelenskyy warned.

Russia did some counter-warning of its own, accusing Kyiv of firing rockets at the dam, planning ultimately to destroy it; a sign according to Ukrainian officials that Moscow may take the initiative to blow it  up and then place the blame with Kyiv. It's a tried-and-untrue method that finds favour with the Kremlin; accuse Ukraine of responsibility for the most brazen war crimes against its own people as well as Russians, that Russia itself has been engaged with.

 

A van moves along a dark street during electricity shortage, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Mykolaiv, Ukraine October 20, 2022. REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko

Bursting the dam  could see a wall of water flooding settlements below, toward the city of Kherson. The Dnipro River is several kilometres wide in places. The canal system irrigating much of southern Ukraine that includes Crimea would also be ruined. Further upriver, Ukrainian historians document Soviet sappers having dynamited another huge dam with the retreat of their troops, causing floods that swept away villages and killed thousands of people, during the Second World War.

The potential of such widespread destruction, pointed out President Zelenskyy would have results "exactly the same as the use of weapons of mass destruction". Ukrainian forces are advancing along the river's west bank with the intention of regaining Kherson city and encircling thousands of Russian troops. Russia's newly appointed commander Sergei Srovikin, infamous for his command of the Russian aerial bombardment in Syria, against the regime's opponents, spoke of the situation in Kherson as "already difficult" leading Russia to "not ruling out difficult decisions".

In the area, Ukrainian troops have identified a secton of the front north of Kherson with a noticeable reduction in shellfire from Ruissian positions, about four kilometres away. Speculation among them is that the droppoff in shooting and absence of armour indicate a shortage of ammunition and equipment for Russia. "They've been shooting less starting about three weks ago. And their drones are less active", pointed out Myhailo, a soldier deployed in the area.

Vladimir Putin began a campaign of attacks with the use of cruise missiles and Iranian drones earlier in the month to destroy Ukraine's power supply before the onset of winter. Ukraine's energy infrastructure has also come under fire, but Moscow will not admit to its targeting of civilians; the aim, they claim of the "special military operation" is to degrade Ukraine's military. Calls countrywide to reduce electricity consumption alerted Ukrainians to straitened conditions ahead.

Russian President Vladimir Putin visits a training centre of the Western Military District for mobilised reservists along with Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and Deputy Commander of the Airborne Troops Anatoly Kontsevoy, in Ryazan Region, Russia October 20, 2022. Russian Defence Ministry/Handout via REUTERS

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a meeting with members of the Security Council via a video link in Saint Petersburg, Russia, October 10, 2022. Sputnik/Gavriil Grigorov/Kremlin via REUTERS

"Now I am 100% satisfied with how the special military operation is being conducted."

"We warned you Zelensky, that Russia hasn't even got started yet, so stop complaining ... and run!"

Ramzan Kadyrov, pro-Kremlin leader of Russia's Chechnya region

 

"[He ordered] massive [long range strikes after an attack on the bridge linking Russia to the annexed Crimean peninsula over the weekend, and threatened more strikes in future if Ukraine hits Russian territory]."

"To leave such acts without a response is simply impossible [alleging other, unspecified attacks on Russian energy infrastructure]."

Russian President Vladimir Putin

Russia's 'special military operation' launched on February24, which has since displaced millions of Ukrainians, killed tens of thousands, wounded many more, destroyed critical civilian infrastructure, caused a threat of famine in developing nations worldwide, disrupted the delivery of gas and oil to Europe, harmed an already-battered world economy and brought Russia to the brink of total political/diplomatic isolation on the world stage was, as Mr. Putin would have it, totally within reason.

 

The response of the Ukrainian government and its resourceful military, on the other hand, with its hugely successful counteroffensive represented an act of pure terrorism, one that only Russia recognizes for what it is, while the rest of the world cringes in horror at Russia's response, condemning the man who has ordered the invasion, isolating his country, imposed crippling sanctions, and awaits another Russian civil revolution to remove him from office. Meanwhile the threat of nuclear action hovers.

 

The New York Times

 Against all acceptable international norms, Moscow has annexed more swaths of Ukrainian territory to add to its illegal and universally condemned annexation in 2014 of the Crimean Peninsula and the port of Sevastopol. Russia has closed shipping off to Ukraine from the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, impacting grains and consumer oils and fertilizers for worldwide delivery. Ukraine has been warned that any moves on its part to regain territory now in Russia's hands would be construed as a declaration of war.

The conflict named as a special military operation is not to be considered war. And should Ukraine launch attacks on Russian territory -- so recently part of Ukraine -- it must prepare for all-out war. As though this is not what has been happening. And while Putin makes grand declarations of territorial annexation, the Ukrainian counteroffensive is retaking town after town in the occupied areas newly declared Russian, while Russian troops are retreating in disarray leaving behind their tanks and their trucks and their arms.

 

A medical worker walks near a burned car after Russian military strike, as Russia's invasion of Ukraine continues, in central Kyiv, Ukraine October 10, 2022. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich

 

 Not only has Ukraine been placed on notice that it must no longer think of its geography as being intact, merely temporarily in an enemy's possession, earning it a massive retaliation should it attack areas now Russia's, but the West too has been placed on notice. Any notion of engaging with Russia directly by members of Western military in support of Ukraine's military on the battlefield will be the death knell of the long stretch of time without a world war. The Third World War, Moscow warns, will be launched should the U.S. or NATO directly intervene in Ukraine's illegal, terrorist efforts against Russia's will.

There is no such thing any longer as a 'conventional' war. Drones and missiles, thermobaric bombs, technically advanced war materiel of every description called into play to achieve maximum destruction. And if all that fails, there are nuclear bombs, tactically used and limited -- at least initially, sending a message of more potentially to come should Russia's fortunes on the battlefield continue to deteriorate because another country dares defend itself against a depraved tyrannical oppressor.

 

Firefighters work at a site of an infrastructure object damaged by a Russian missile strike, amid Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine October 10, 2022. Press service of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine/Handout via REUTERS

Russian missiles were sent on their punishing retaliatory mission following the explosions on the Crimea bridge linking mainland Russia to the peninsula. Intersections, parks and tourist sites in Kyiv and explosions reported in Lviv, Ternopil and Zhytomyr in western Ukraine, Dnipro and Kremenchuk in the centre, Zaporizhzhia in the south and Kharkiv in the east. In long-range assaults Russia is confident; meeting on the battlefield where personal courage, strategic military expertise and fighting skills count sees Russian troops shrinking from direct combat and slinking steadily away in panic.

Cruise missiles fired from land, sea and air in waves of strikes hitting locations nowhere near the front lines. And more to come, snarls Vladimir Putin, should Ukraine continue its obstinacy in protecting its territory from wholesale theft.These assaults were no spur-of-the-moment decision-making on the part of the elite Russian military establishment, Their president had long ago ordered plans be drawn up for just such a concerted barrage. 

 

His outrage would be molten should Ukraine ever order missiles to fire over its border into Russian territory, razing civil infrastructure, hitting Russian civilians. 

 

Cars are seen on fire after Russian missile strikes, as Russia's attack continues, in Kyiv, Ukraine October 10, 2022. REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko