The war in Ukraine has created more refugees than the world has seen since World War II, according to a new UN report
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The UN has released a new report detailing crimes committed during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
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The report details war crimes, including torture and rape of civilians and the deportation of children.
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The invasion created more refugees and displaced more people than the world has seen since World War II.
More than a year after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, a new report by the United Nations Independent Commission of Inquiry into Ukraine found evidence of war crimes, including systematic rape, torture and killing of civilians, and indiscriminate attacks on infrastructure that displaced millions have.
According to the United Nations, more people have fled Ukraine or been internally displaced since the war began than the world has since World War II.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees reports that as of February 21, around eight million refugees have been displaced from Ukraine across Europe – about 90 percent of them women and children. In addition, there are currently around 5.4 million displaced people in Ukraine who remain in the country.
“Nearly 18 million people in Ukraine are in need of humanitarian assistance and have faced particularly harsh conditions during the winter months,” the report said. “The conflict has affected people’s rights to health, education, decent housing, food and water. Some vulnerable groups such as the elderly, children, people with disabilities and members of minorities are particularly affected. No region of the country has been spared from the conflict.”
As of February 15, OHCHR had recorded 8,006 civilians killed and 13,287 injured in Ukraine since the invasion began on February 24 last year, although the report indicates officials believe the actual numbers are “considerably higher.”
To complete their report, members of the United Nations Commission visited 56 communities affected by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and conducted interviews with 348 women and 247 men. Investigators said they saw “sites of destruction, graves, places of detention and torture, and remains of weapons,” according to a UN statement emailed to insiders.
The report noted that two cases of alleged war crimes by Ukrainian forces were under investigation, but evidence suggests that “Russian authorities committed a wide range of violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law in many regions of Ukraine and in the Russian Federation” , the report said, including “premeditated killings, attacks on civilians, unlawful detention, torture, rape and forced rendition and deportation of children”.
“They punished innocent people; now the guilty, if they are still alive, must be punished in full,” a man whose father was executed by Russian forces in the Izium region told members of the commission. according to a statement from the UN emailed to insiders.
The International Criminal Court, a tribunal based in The Hague, Netherlands, on Friday issued an international arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin, accusing Russia’s war crimes leader and demanding that he be brought to justice – although he is unlikely to do so as Russia , like the US, does not recognize the authority of the ICC.
Because of his failure to control the military personnel who committed the crimes, Putin is allegedly responsible for the war crime of forcibly deporting children from the occupied territories of Ukraine to the Russian Federation, the ICC said in a statement on Friday.
A State Department spokesman told Insider, “There is no doubt that Russia is committing war crimes and atrocities in Ukraine, and we have made it clear that those responsible must be held accountable.”
Officials from the ICC and the State Department did not immediately respond to insiders’ requests for comment.
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