Last night, the Russian army carried out mass shelling in several areas of the Kharkiv region, resulting in rescuers being hit by repeated fire twice while addressing the aftermath of the attacks. This was reported by the State Emergency Service.
This is reported by Finway
Shelled Areas and Impact on Civilians
As a result of the enemy’s night strikes, the Zolochiv, Malynivka, and Velykoburlutska communities, as well as the city of Kharkiv, were affected. A 39-year-old woman was injured due to the shelling, and infrastructure facilities and private homes were destroyed. During the firefighting efforts, the Russians opened fire on the rescuers twice, damaging a fire truck, but the emergency service workers themselves were not harmed. Units of the service are involved in the cleanup efforts.
“During the firefighting efforts, the Russians carried out repeated strikes twice. A fire truck was damaged, but the rescuers were unharmed. Units of the State Emergency Service are involved in the work.”
According to the head of the Kharkiv regional administration, Oleg Synegubov, three people were killed and another 16 were injured in the region due to Russian attacks the day before.
Systematic Strikes and Signs of Genocide
Russian military forces systematically carry out repeated strikes on already attacked locations, leading to the deaths and injuries of Ukrainian rescuers, medics, and energy workers. The occupiers use various types of weapons – strike drones, missiles, guided bombs, and multiple launch rocket systems – to attack Ukrainian cities and civilian infrastructure across the country.
The Ukrainian authorities and international organizations classify these actions as war crimes of the Russian Federation, emphasizing their targeted nature. The shelling of vital infrastructure and healthcare facilities, which deprives people of electricity, heat, water supply, communication, and medical assistance, bears the hallmarks of genocidal actions.
It is also emphasized that such crimes are accompanied by public calls from the Russian leadership for the destruction of the Ukrainian people, the persecution and extermination of individuals with pro-Ukrainian positions in occupied territories, the destruction of the intelligentsia, and the alteration of children’s identities through deportation and the theft of cultural values.
According to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948, participating countries are obligated to prevent and punish acts of genocide during wartime and in peacetime. Genocide is defined as actions aimed at the total or partial destruction of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group – killing members of the group, causing them serious bodily or mental harm, creating living conditions intended to destroy the group, preventing births within the group, and forcibly transferring children to another group.
However, the leadership of Russia denies the facts of targeted strikes on the civilian infrastructure of Ukrainian cities and villages, despite numerous evidence of the destruction of hospitals, schools, kindergartens, energy facilities, and water supply systems.