On the night of September 19, the Russians launched another attack on Ukrainian cities, deploying Iranian-made one-way attack drones. They also launched an Iskander-M ballistic missile from occupied Crimea. After the latter was intercepted, its debris caused a fire in Kryvyi Rih. In total, 27 of 30 UAVs targeting Ukraine’s western regions were shot down. Russia continues to shell Ukrainian cities far beyond the frontline: this is an ongoing crime against the civilian population.
As a result of an overnight attack on Lviv-based warehouses where humanitarian aid and household chemicals were stored, a civilian was killed. The man’s body was retrieved from under the rubble. In addition, two local residents were injured. The blaze raged on an area of over 10,000 square meters. In the morning of the same day, Russian artillery shelled Kherson where projectile fragments hit a trolleybus full of commuters. As a result of this war crime, a local resident died on the spot, two were hospitalized with injuries. One of the said civilians later succumbed to his wounds. These tragic cases are yet another manifestation of Russian war crimes against the civilian population of Ukraine: almost on a daily basis, the Russian Air Force strikes peaceful cities in the Ukrainian rear. Such actions pursue no military objective — Putin simply seeks to inflict as much destruction and casualties as possible, systemically terrorizing the Ukrainian population. This is the genocide of a nation, green-lighted in the Kremlin, and it is taking place in the 21st century in a country right to the east of EU’s borders.
Russia is expected to further intensify its shelling and bombing of Ukraine with the onset of cold weather. Putin’s propaganda, copycatting that of the Soviet regime, lies about the crimes that the Russian invasion army commits in Ukraine. Since February 2022, the Russian Air Force has been targeting households, schools, kindergartens, hospitals, and churches. In its war effort, Russia isn’t guided by any legal, let alone moral, criteria. The full-scale invasion of Ukraine will go down in history as the war of aggression of the 21st century, accompanied by the genocide of the civilian population. Accordingly, the Ukrainian Army, which is now progressing in its counteroffensive, must receive from international partners all types of weapons it requires to seal a convincing victory over Russia and stop Russian crimes against Ukrainians.