The United Nations has confirmed 4,395 civilian deaths resulting from Russia’s outright war against Ukraine and injuries of 5,390 civilians. The statistical update covers the period from February 24 to June 12, according to the UNHCR.
Among the dead are 275 children, as well as 451 among the wounded.
The organization emphasizes that the real numbers are much higher “because information from some places where intense hostilities are taking place is delayed, and many reports of civilian casualties are yet to be confirmed.”
This applies, for example, to the settlements of Mariupol (Donetsk region), Izyum (Kharkiv region) and Popasna (Luhansk region), “where, according to reports, there have been multiple civilian deaths and injuries.”
The UN added that most of the civilian casualties were caused by explosive weapons with a wide range of damage, including heavy artillery and multiple rocket launchers, as well as missiles and air strikes.
Ukraine is investigating more than 180 cases of Russia using banned cluster munitions.
In ten regions of Ukraine, law enforcement are investigating at least 183 cases of the Russian Federation employing cluster munitions proscribed by international humanitarian law. This was reported in the Information Policy Service at the Office of the Prosecutor General in response to an inquiry by RFE/RL.
On February 24, law enforcement operatives launched 84 criminal proceedings over the use of cluster munitions by Russian troops.
These include 33 in Dnipropetrovsk, 17 – in Mykolaiv region, 11 – in Kherson region, six – in Donetsk region, five – in Zhytomyr region, four – in Kyiv region, three – in Kharkiv region, three – in Zaporizhia region, one – in Sumy and Chernihiv regions each.
In these areas, cluster munitions killed 98 civilians, including seven children, and injured 219, including 25 children, police said.
Since the first days of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Russian troops have regularly used cluster munitions banned by international conventions.
Cluster munitions are containers filled with dozens of bombs designed to scatter over large areas and to explode upon impact. They can be launched by artillery systems or dropped from aircraft. Many of them fail to explode on initial impact, remaining on the ground for years, posing a threat to people’s lives.
More than 100 nations have signed an agreement to ban their use. Neither Ukraine nor Russia signed the accord. The United States accuses Russia of using cluster bombs against civilians. The United Nations and international human rights organizations are verifying Russia’s crimes and calling for Moscow to cease them.
