Last night, Russian military forces launched attacks on Dnipro and Kharkiv, resulting in injuries to 14 individuals, including children. This was reported by the local authorities of both cities.
This is reported by Finway
Consequences of Shelling in Kharkiv and Dnipro
According to the mayor of Kharkiv, Ihor Terekhov, a Russian strike drone “Shahed” hit the Kholodnohirskiy district of the city. As a result of the explosion, four residents were injured, including a 10-year-old girl. The shelling damaged private houses and outbuildings, leading to destruction and the need for rescue operations.
In Dnipro, as a result of the nighttime attack by Russia, ten people were injured, including a 12-year-old boy. This was reported by the head of the regional military administration, Oleksandr Hanzha. The shockwave damaged a multi-story residential building, and residents are receiving assistance while emergency services are working on-site.
Systematic Strikes on Civil Infrastructure
Russian military forces regularly use various types of weapons to attack Ukrainian cities, including strike drones, missiles, aviation bombs, and multiple launch rocket systems. As a result of such shelling, not only critical infrastructure is affected, but also the civilian population across all regions of Ukraine.
The Ukrainian authorities and international organizations classify these strikes as war crimes committed by the Russian Federation and emphasize that they are targeted in nature.
Targeted shelling of life-support systems, healthcare facilities, energy and communal infrastructure, as well as depriving residents of electricity, heat, water, communication, and medical assistance are viewed as signs of genocidal actions. Legal experts and genocide researchers indicate that during the full-scale war, Russia is committing crimes against the citizens of Ukraine that may fall under the definition of genocide.
- Declarations of intent to destroy Ukrainians: representatives of the Russian authorities have repeatedly stated that Ukrainians as an ethnicity “do not exist,” and those who disagree “must be destroyed.”
- Public calls for the elimination of Ukrainians.
- Systematic shelling of vital facilities and medical institutions aimed at depriving the population of basic living conditions.
- Persecution and extermination of individuals with pro-Ukrainian positions in occupied territories.
- Extermination of representatives of the intelligentsia – teachers, artists, and bearers of Ukrainian culture.
- Imposition of educational programs in occupied territories aimed at altering the identity of children.
- Deportation of children without parents to Russia for the purpose of changing their identity.
- Seizure and destruction of Ukrainian books from libraries, looting of museums, and theft of artifacts that document the history of Ukrainians.
The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948, obligates 149 participating countries to prevent acts of genocide and to punish them in both wartime and peacetime.
According to the Convention, genocide is defined as actions aimed at the total or partial destruction of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. Among the signs of genocide are the killing of group members, causing serious bodily harm, creating unbearable living conditions, preventing childbirth, forcibly transferring children, and publicly inciting such actions.
The leadership of Russia denies involvement in the deliberate shelling of Ukraine’s civil infrastructure; however, instances of destruction of hospitals, schools, energy facilities, and residential buildings are regularly documented.