Qualla: Russian attacks on civilians in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present)

Russian attacks on civilians in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present): Introduction

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit State Emergency Service of Ukraine, CC BY 4.0. On July 14, 2022, Iryna Dmytrieva posted a video on social media. It showed her four-year-old daughter Liza, who had Down syndrome, straining to push her own stroller through the streets of Vinnytsia. Liza wore a denim jacket and white pants. Her hair was pinned with a barrette. Her family had fled Kyiv earlier in the war and Vinnytsia, hundreds of kilometers from the front, seemed safe enough. About forty minutes after Iryna posted the video, Russian Kalibr cruise missiles fired from a Black Sea submarine struck the city center. Twenty-eight people died. Three of them were children. Liza was one. Her mother survived with severe injuries. The Ukrainian Orthodox priest who buried Liza days later told her grieving relatives that evil cannot win. As of January 2026, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights had documented 15,172 civilian deaths in Ukraine since the full-scale invasion began on February 24, 2022. The actual number is certainly higher.

Image: State Emergency Service of Ukraine | CC BY 4.0

Russian attacks on civilians in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present): Bucha

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Оксана Іванець, Олександр Козубенко, CC BY 4.0. When Russian forces withdrew from the Kyiv suburbs in late March 2022, Ukrainian troops entering Bucha found bodies in the streets, in basements, and in shallow graves. Many had their hands tied. Some had been tortured. Investigators eventually documented at least 458 civilian vi...

Image: Оксана Іванець, Олександр Козубенко | CC BY 4.0

Russian attacks on civilians in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present): Mariupol

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit State Emergency Service of Ukraine, CC BY 4.0. The siege of Mariupol lasted nearly three months in early 2022. Russian forces shelled and bombed the port city continuously. Local officials estimated by April that more than 21,000 civilians had been killed and 95% of the city destroyed. On March 9, a Russian airstrike hit Chil...

Image: State Emergency Service of Ukraine | CC BY 4.0

Russian attacks on civilians in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present): Trains, Restaurants, Apartment Blocks

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit State Emergency Service of Ukraine, CC BY 4.0. On April 8, 2022, Russian Tochka-U missiles armed with cluster munitions hit the Kramatorsk railway station, where civilians from across Donbas were waiting to be evacuated west. At least 60 people died. On January 14, 2023, a Russian Kh-22 missile destroyed an entire entrance of...

Image: State Emergency Service of Ukraine | CC BY 4.0

Russian attacks on civilians in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present): The Power Grid in Winter

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kharkiv Regional State Administration, CC BY 4.0. Beginning in October 2022, Russia turned its long-range missile campaign toward Ukraine's electrical infrastructure. Power stations, transformers, heating plants, and substations across the country became targets, particularly in the months leading into winter. The campaign repea...

Image: Kharkiv Regional State Administration | CC BY 4.0

Russian attacks on civilians in the Russo-Ukrainian war (2022–present): The Names That Are Known

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit National Police of Ukraine, CC BY 4.0. International humanitarian law treats deliberate attacks on civilians as war crimes. Many of the attacks described above have been formally categorized as such by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, the OHCHR, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, and t...

Image: National Police of Ukraine | CC BY 4.0