Amnesty International confirms Russian siege tactics and indiscriminate attacks in Ukraine

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On the morning of March 4, in the second largest city in eastern Ukraine, in the Mala-Danilivka district of Kharkov, a 41-year-old family man, Olesky Stovba, was injured in an attack while shopping for food. “We found food, we were standing outside the grocery store and I heard a lot of noise. I turned around and saw a small flame. It was up to my knees, 50 meters from me. I fell down and my wife too and I felt something hit me in the right leg. I took off my pants and saw a lot of blood. ”

Surgeons removed three fragments of the right abdomen, calf and leg. An Amnesty International (AI) investigator personally examined the evidence: the bulk was from cluster munitions. These weapons have a long-term effect that makes them substantially inaccurate and are prohibited by international treaty.

The Saltivka district of Kharkov has also been the target of repeated attacks. There, the NGO Crisis Testing Laboratory checked 22 incidents that showed damaged civilian areas such as schools, buildings, markets and a railway station., From 27 February to 16 March. Photos of the attacks show remnants of Smerch missiles – a Russian multiple launch system – and cluster munitions throughout the area.

“It became my new reality: shooting and shooting, helping old women from the rubble, gas, water, electricity. “We boil ice every three days to get water,” said one man who runs a shelter in Saltivka, home to 300 people. “Most of them are older, weak, asthma, diabetes. “Some have not left the shelter for three weeks.”

During the on-site investigation, a human rights group condemned the Russian Army’s siege of Ukraine’s war tactics, “characterized by relentless indiscriminate attacks in densely populated areas, illegally killing civilians in several cities.”

The NGO’s field investigators in Ukraine for the first time independently verified the physical evidence of cluster munitions, the use of which “violates international law,” they say. The unit has already confirmed that cluster bombs killed a child and two other civilians who were sheltering in a preschool in the Sumy region, and recorded an airstrike that killed people standing in Chernigov to buy food.

In addition, the team collected testimonies such as Olesky Stovba to substantiate Russian siege tactics, including unlawful indiscriminate attacks, disruption of basic services, disruption of communication, destruction of civilian infrastructure, and restriction of access to medical care.

Indiscriminate attacks

Russian forces, as the NGO recalls, have used weapons in recent weeks that have substantially indistinguishable effects – such as cluster munitions and low-precision weapons impacting large areas, such as “dumb” bombs and firing from multiple missile launchers. During attacks on densely populated areas.

Amnesty International considers that attacks by Russian forces on cities and towns and the destruction of infrastructure necessary for daily life violate international humanitarian law and international human rights law. Indiscriminate attacks that kill or injure civilians “also constitute a war crime,” the NGO said in a statement.

Joan Mariner, director of the Artificial Intelligence Crisis Response Program, said that the “characteristic feature” of this “brutal siege” was “relentless indiscriminate attacks by Russia, leading to its complete destruction over time.” Civilians trapped in besieged cities, the NGO said, should have “emergency” access to humanitarian corridors to allow safe evacuation of those who have to leave and deliver humanitarian supplies to the survivors.

The NGO interviewed besieged people in five cities, including Kharkov and Mariupol, as well as analyzed satellite images and verified video and photos of the incidents.

In Kharkov – on the outskirts of which Russian forces arrived in the early days, trying to encircle the city – they observed a “wide pattern of indiscriminate attacks” in populated areas. On February 28, three NGO rocket-propelled grenades hit the northern part of the city, killing at least nine civilians, including minors, according to the NGO.

The research team also interviewed a 16-year-old girl who was evacuated from Kharkov alone to a Lviv shelter in western Ukraine. The organization verified the image, which shows the remains of a 220mm Uragán multiple launch system rocket that crashed near the residential complex where his family lives, near the school. “The rocket fell at night; I smelled fire and shivered. From the very first day of the war, my whole family, all of us, have been living in the corridor of the apartment building. ”

No basic services

The disruption of mobile phones and internet services makes it very difficult to communicate with civilians in besieged cities, according to the NGO, which recalls that many people spend most of their time in underground bomb shelters where coverage is limited or too much. Weak. However, access to communications and the Internet is “essential for safety and for vital information on possible evacuation routes.”

In Kharkov and Izum – a city in the east where NGOs have condemned the civilian population on the brink of a humanitarian catastrophe – the attacks damaged a building where TV towers were erected. According to the investigation, the building of the Kharkov TV tower was allegedly damaged from February 27 to March 17, and the service was terminated on March 6. On March 12, the building connected to the Izumi TV tower was damaged and damaged until March 20. Broadcasting ceased. “Many older people rely on television for government news and emergency information.”

The siege tactics are exacerbating the significant impact the conflict is already having on the elderly and people with disabilities, recalls the testimony of Alexander Mihta, a 39-year-old Kharkiv man with diabetes who has serious gait problems. Because of the injury that the disease had inflicted on his legs.

As they explain, Alexander drove his wife and children to the Polish border, but then had to stay in Ukraine due to the state of war. Smerch rockets hit the building where he lived, leaving them without heat and flooding the lower floors. An artificial intelligence team checked 21 photos that confirmed damage to the apartment building. Mihta managed to escape to a Lviv shelter with her father.

“The bombings were getting worse. I needed food, so I went shopping. I have diabetes and when the shells hardened, I ran and broke my leg. I tried to get to the bomb shelter but could not. “I broke six bones and the doctors wanted to amputate me,” said the man. The NGO recalls that priority in evacuation should be given to the elderly and people with disabilities.


Source: El Diario

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