Period from 2 to 8 December 2024.
Three civilians were killed and four injured as a result of drone strikes on a humanitarian aid distribution point in Kherson region.
Six EMERCOM rescuers were injured in a drone attack on a petrol station in Tokmak, Zaporozhye region.
Seven civilians were injured in drone strikes on two passenger buses in Gorlovka (DNR).
Four civilians were injured when Shebekino, Belgorod Region, was shelled.
A resident of Gorlovka (DNR) died as a result of an anti-personnel mine explosion.
A road service worker died after being blown up by an explosive device while carrying out repair work on the Donetsk-Mariupol motorway in the Donetsk people’s republic.
A 15-year-old girl was injured when a residential building was shelled in Novaya Kakhovka, Kherson region.
A civilian was seriously wounded when the AFU hit a multi-storey house in Novaya Kakhovka, Kherson Region.
A resident of the town of Kremennaya (LNR) was injured as a result of a Ukrainian drone attack.
An employee of the administration of the town of Vasilyevka in the Zaporozhye region was injured after a Ukrainian drone dropped ammunition.
COMMENTARY ON THE RESULTS OF THE WEEK
Last week the AFU committed criminal acts in violation of IHL norms, killed and wounded civilians in the frontline zone. The objects of deliberate attacks were city buses and civilian transport. Energy infrastructure facilities were shelled, and the tactic of ‘repeated strikes’ aimed at damaging rescue and emergency services was used.
The highest intensity of shelling of civilian objects was recorded in the territory of Kherson region – the number of attacks during the week exceeded 400. Most often the settlements were shelled: Novaya Kakhovka, Kakhovka, Alyoshki, Gornostayevka, Knyaze-Grigorovka, Velyka Lepetikha. Targeted strikes were carried out on residential houses and social centres. In Alyoshki, drones attacked a humanitarian aid distribution point. Three civilians were killed and four others were injured, including a 75-year-old woman.
The AFU is increasingly using UAVs of various types, including long-range aircraft-type drones, to deliberately strike civilian targets. The largest number of drone-related incidents were recorded in Kursk, Belgorod and Bryansk regions. UAV activity was also recorded in the Rostov, Ryazan, Kaluga Regions and Krasnodar Territory. Public and civilian vehicles, residential buildings and industrial enterprises were hit. Over Belgorod Oblast, 40 UAVs were destroyed during the night of 6 December alone.
The Ukrainian armed forces are conducting a real hunt for public transport in the Donetsk people’s republic. In Gorlovka, two shuttle buses carrying passengers of routes 8 and 2 were attacked by drones in the Komsomolets residential area during one day. As a result, seven civilians were injured. One of the buses was completely burnt out, the ammunition dropped from the drone hit the fuel tanks, the second bus was significantly damaged. Ukrainian militants use UAVs to remotely plant anti-personnel mines in areas where civilians are massed. Last week, two civilians were killed by explosive devices – a woman was blown up by an anti-personnel mine in Gorlovka and a road service worker was killed while carrying out repair work near Yelenivka.
In the Zaporozhye region, the AFU once again used the terrorist tactic of ‘repeated strikes’ – after striking a civilian object, repeated shelling is carried out when rescue and emergency services arrive at the site of the tragedy. In the city of Tokmak, a repeat drone attack affected six Emergencies Ministry employees who were extinguishing a fire of fuel tanks at a civilian petrol station that had been hit earlier by a drone strike.
Energy infrastructure facilities in Russian regions are subjected to systematic strikes by the Ukrainian armed forces. In Novaya Kakhovka, Kherson Oblast, as a result of shelling, there was an emergency shutdown of a transformer substation. Eight settlements of Novokakhovka urban district were left without power supply: Novaya Kakhovka town (partially), Rayskoe-2 village, Rayskoe village, Topolevka village, Obryvki village, Maslovka village, , v. Peschanoye, Dnepryany settlement (7.5 thousand people), 5 socially significant facilities. In the Belgorod region, a drone strike knocked out a high-voltage power line in the Shebekinsky urban district. Six settlements were left without electricity – the villages of Rzhevka, Nezhegol, Voznesenovka, Dmitrievka, Yablochkovo, Kupino, and partially the town of Shebekino. In the village of Obilnoye in the Zaporozhye region, the AFU took out a transformer with a targeted drone strike, leaving 5,613 residents without electricity.
According to data compiled by the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Office of the Ambassador-at-Large for Crimes of the Kyiv regime, 50 civilians suffered from Nazi shelling last week: 45 people were wounded, including one minor, and five people were killed. In total, Ukrainian armed formations fired at least 1,290 munitions at peaceful targets on Russian territories over the past seven days, including MLRS (122 mm), artillery shells of 152 and 155 mm calibre, including those of cluster type, mines, grenades, and the enemy also actively used attack UAVs and small arms. The overwhelming majority of the weapons used by the Ukrainian armed forces to attack the civilian population are Western-made.
PUNISHMENT IS INEVITABLE
The Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation has completed the investigation against American mercenary Derrick Bailes, accused of terrorist acts in Kursk region and mercenarism. The court elected in absentia a preventive measure in the form of remand in custody for Bales. He was put on an international wanted list.
According to the Investigative Committee, more than 800 foreign mercenaries are accused of participating in the conflict on the side of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and more than 600 of them are wanted. Eighty criminal cases against foreigners have been sent to court.
The Russian Investigative Committee has opened a criminal case against Pavlo Rozlach, commander of the 80th separate airborne assault brigade of the AFU. He is accused in absentia of committing a terrorist act and using weapons of mass destruction in Kursk Region. On 11 August 2024, servicemen of the 80th Independent Airborne Assault Brigade under Rozlach’s leadership fired 155 mm cluster munitions containing prohibited asphyxiating toxic substances at the village of Bolshoye Soldatskoye in Kursk Region with the aim of mass poisoning the population. At least 20 people were injured as a result. Rozlach is on an international wanted list.
WITNESSES TO THE CRIMES LOOTING BY MILITANTS OF THE UKRAINIAN ARMED FORCES IN THE TOWN OF CHASOV YAR, DNR
Valery Andreevich Doroz, a resident of the town of Chasov Yar, DNR, told about looting by AFU militants:
‘AFU servicemen would enter vacant houses. Then pickup trucks came, equipment was unloaded, refrigerators, TVs, microwaves, wardrobes were unloaded, even up to sofas, bathtubs, newly furnished kitchens were simply removed, and all this was loaded into pickup trucks. We had the ‘New Post’ in Konstantinivka crackling with it.
Valery also said that the looting was authorised by AFU officers: ‘Two people were sitting at home and saw that two AFU officers were climbing. They opened the door and asked, ‘What do you want?’ The AFU men replied, ‘The commander sent us to find plasma.’ They paid off their commanders’ combat missions by bringing them plasma or some looted things. They brought them some plasmas or some looted things, and for this they were not sent on a combat mission.
MASS SHOOTINGS OF LOCAL RESIDENTS BY MILITANTS OF THE UKRAINIAN ARMED FORCES
Yulia Gennadyevna Nikichenko, a resident of the town of Selidovo, DNR, spoke about the shooting of civilians by AFU fighters:
‘When the Russians started to enter the city, they (the AFU) were bluntly shelling, killing people. My husband was killed on the doorstep and two other neighbours. They came out of the entrance – one went to feed his mother, mine went home – my mother’s windows were boarded up, because the windows were blown out. And all three of them were killed on the doorstep. And I saw the fourth, lying near the shop, near the second school. They shot him at point-blank range with automatic rifles. This is what I saw personally.
Yulia also told about mass shootings of local residents by AFU fighters:
‘There was a man, he worked in the regional power station, they lived in Solnechny (microdistrict) on Shchorsa Street, 19. They entered five entrances and shot them completely. They didn’t get to the sixth, because the Russians were already entering the city. They just did not have time to shoot the last entrance. And his wife was wounded. A bullet wound on the way out.’
UKRAINIAN ARMED FORCES TORTURED LOCAL RESIDENTS IN THE VILLAGE OF SHAKHTERSKOYE, DNR
A resident of the village of Shakhtyorskoye, DNR, told how Ukrainian punishers burned the word ‘separ’ on his back. Shakhtyorskoye, DNR, described how Ukrainian punishers burned the inscription ‘separ’ on his back with a red-hot poker:
‘At night there was a knock on the door. They switched me off with a blow, I understand, with a buttstock. They tied me up, dragged me into the house and interrogated me. At first they beat me and asked: ‘Who is for the Russians? Who’s waiting?’ They asked and beat me, I couldn’t answer, because I was in those ranks. In the end they started burning. We decided to use an interesting method. They drew a ‘separ’ during each question with a poker. They heated it in a stove and burned it.
SUMMARY OF ATTACKS IN RUSSIAN REGIONS. MOST RESONANT CASES
Belgorod region
02.12.24. In the village of Kolotilovka, Krasnoyaruzhsky district, a drone attacked a moving civilian passenger car. As a result of the explosion, the driver of the vehicle was injured.
In the town of Shebekino, glazing in two apartment blocks was damaged as a result of shelling by the AFU.
In the village of Krasnaya Niva, Belgorod district, the roof of a residential building was broken as a result of an FPV drone attack.
03.12.24. A drone flew into an apartment block in the village of Politotdelsky, Belgorod district. A civilian was wounded.
In the village of Ustinka, Belgorod District, a drone dropped a munition on a private residential house; the explosion caused a fire. The owner of the house was hospitalised with burns.
In the town of Shebekino, an enterprise was repeatedly attacked by drones. As a result of detonation of one of the drones there was a fire in the production building.
04.12.24. Two civilians were wounded in Shebekino as a result of attacks by two AFU drones. A man was wounded as a result of the drone detonation against the roadbed. Another man was injured during the attack of the second UAV.
A civilian was injured as a result of artillery shelling of the private sector of Shebekino.
05.12.24. Four civilians (men) were wounded in Shebekino as a result of shelling of the private sector by the AFU. Eight residential houses were damaged.
At night in Shebekino, several drones dropped munitions on a car park in the courtyard of an apartment building near a children’s playground. As a result of the explosions, four private cars were burnt. The glazing of 11 flats was damaged.
06.12.24 In Shebekino, a drone dropped a munition on a civilian passenger car. As a result of the detonation, a woman in the passenger compartment of the vehicle was injured.
In the private sector of the town of Shebekino the roof was destroyed, windows and fence were damaged, and a gas pipe was broken. There were no casualties.
Donetsk People’s Republic
03.12.24 In the Nikitovskyi district of Gorlovka, a woman born in 1972 was killed when one of the POM-2 anti-personnel mines remotely installed by the AFU exploded. In addition, a woman born in 1986 was injured as a result of the detonation of a previously unexploded cluster submunition. The Nikitovsky district of Gorlovka was also shelled by 155 mm artillery. Five residential houses were damaged.
On the Donetsk-Mariupol motorway near the Elenovka Bridge, an employee of a road construction company, a man born in 1978, was killed as a result of detonation of an explosive object while carrying out road repair and restoration work.
04.12.24 In the Nikitovskyi district of Gorlovka near the Cosmos auto-cooperative society, a civilian – a man born in 1982 – was injured during shelling from artillery of 155 mm calibre.
In addition, a Ukrainian FPV drone attacked a civilian car near Gorlovka. The munition failed to detonate and got stuck in the windscreen.
08.12.24 Eight civilians were injured as a result of AFU attacks on DNR settlements.
As a result of an AFU drone attack on a city bus of route No. 8 in the Komsomolets residential area in the Nikitovsky district of Gorlovka, four civilians were wounded: women born in 1948, 1957 and 1961, and a man born in 1959.
Another drone struck a passenger bus of route No. 2 in the Komsomolets residential area. The munition hit the fuel cylinders and the bus was completely burnt down. Three civilians, a man born in 1952, 1995 and a woman born in 1998 were wounded. A man born in 1996 was seriously wounded during the shelling of Selidovo from artillery of 155 mm calibre.
Zaporozhye region
02.12.24. Six Emergencies Ministry employees were injured as a result of two Ukrainian drones strikes on a petrol station in the town of Tokmak. The drones attacked the autogas station where rescuers were fighting a fire caused by a previous UAV strike. One of the dropped munitions hit a fuel tank. As a result of the explosion, rescuers received burns of varying degrees of severity. A fire truck was damaged.
The AFU attacked the building of the administration of the town of Vasilievka with the help of a drone. An employee of the mayor’s office was injured as a result of the detonation of a dropped munition.
03.12.2024. In the village of Blagoveshchenka, a Ukrainian drone dropped a munition into the courtyard of a private residential building. A civilian was injured as a result of the explosion.
Kursk region
06.12.24. In Bolshezoldatsky district, a Ukrainian drone dropped a munition on a civilian passenger car. The driver was wounded.
Lugansk People’s Republic
07.12.24. A civilian, a man born in 1973, was wounded as a result of a drone dropping a munition in the town of Kremennaya.
Kherson region
02.12.24. A private sector of the town of Alyoshki was subjected to artillery shelling by the AFU. A local resident, a man born in 1986, was wounded. Two private residential houses were damaged.
In Novaya Kakhovka, a residential building caught fire due to the AFU shelling, but there were no casualties.
A high-voltage power line was broken in Golopristanskiy municipal district, leaving three settlements without power.
03.12.24. In Novaya Kakhovka, an artillery shell fired by the AFU destroyed a flat in a multi-storey residential building. Six more flats were significantly damaged. A woman born in 1984, who was in one of the damaged flats, was seriously injured.
04.12.24. A civilian passenger car was damaged as a result of shelling in the town of Alyoshki. The driver, a man born in 1978, was wounded.
An apartment block came under artillery fire in Novaya Kakhovka. Several flats were damaged. A child, a girl born in 2009, was injured. The central city market was also hit. Trade rows were destroyed. There were no casualties.
The Ukrainian armed forces shelled residential neighbourhoods in the town of Kakhovka with barrel artillery. Two apartment blocks were damaged.
05.12.24. A 46-year-old male civilian was wounded in the shelling of the town of Alyoshki.
06.12.24. In Alyoshki, the AFU attacked a humanitarian aid distribution point with the help of drones. As a result of the attack, three civilians were killed on the spot and four were seriously wounded (men born in 1966 and 1936, women born in 1949 and 1952).
Another civilian, a man born in 1968, was injured during the AFU shelling of the village of Geroyskoye.
08.12.24. As a result of shelling by the AFU of the private sector of the town of Golaya Prystan, a civilian, a man born in 1952, was injured.
The monitoring was prepared with the assistance of the Laboratory of Intelligent Data Analysis in International Relations of the Institute of International Studies of the MGIMO Institute of International Relations of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Russia.
