UN report finds Russia deliberately targeted civilians in deadly drone attacks on Ukraine’s Kherson region

A new report by the UN’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine, which is investigating human rights violations amid the ongoing Russian invasion, has accused Russia of killing almost 150 civilians in southern Ukraine’s Kherson region with the use of drones.

The attacks “followed a regular pattern”, demonstrating that they were “planned, directed and organised”, the commission said in a press release on Wednesday. The commission has found no evidence of the Russian military taking any steps to prevent those crimes.

The report cited over 300 publicly available videos of drone feeds posted to Russian pro-war Telegram channels. The videos showed the drones focusing on targets that were “visibly civilian” and dropping explosives on them. The commission also interviewed 91 people from the areas affected by drones, including victims, witnesses, and local officials.

Deliberately targeting civilians and posting footage of them being killed or injured are both war crimes, the commision ruled, adding that the scale and intensity of such attacks “suggest a coordinated state policy” by the Russian authorities to force the population of the Kherson region to leave the area, constituting the crime against humanity of forcible population transfer.

“They are simply chasing and hunting civilians who are on their way to work or walking their dogs,” a senior health professional from Kherson interviewed by the commission said of the Russian forces. “They drop explosives from drones like it is a video game.”

The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry welcomed the report’s publication in a statement on Wednesday, noting that it was the first international report to draw attention to the Kherson region, which has remained partially occupied by Russia since Ukraine liberated its capital and the settlements on the right bank of the Dnipro River in November 2022.

“The ongoing terror inflicted by the Russian Federation on the people of Kherson since the de-occupation of the city and the right-bank areas, represents a shameful tactic of terror against civilians that must be brought to an end,” the ministry wrote.

The Russian authorities have not acknowledged the report.

Established just a week after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the commission is mandated by the UN to investigate human rights abuses and violations of international humanitarian law by Russian forces.