Russian strikes in Vinnytsia kill at least 21, with gruesome civilian toll
Russian missiles struck a business center in the central Ukrainian city of Vinnytsia on Thursday, killing at least 21 people in an attack Ukrainian authorities described as a war crime and act of terrorism.
The strikes, by three cruise missiles launched from a Russian submarine in the Black Sea, damaged a nine-story office block and destroyed cars in its parking lot far from the war’s front lines at around 10:50 a.m. local time, Ukrainian officials said, according to Reuters. Restaurants and nearby residential buildings also appeared to have been struck in the attack. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said two “community facilities” had been destroyed.
The Ukrainian prosecutor general’s office said three children were among the dead, and 90 people were injured. In addition to the 21 killed, at least 46 people are considered missing in the aftermath, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy chief of staff to Zelenskyy, said on Telegram.
In photos sent to The Washington Post by Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine’s Interior Ministry, who said they were taken at the scene, a bloodied child can be seen lying next to a severed adult foot, her legs at an unnatural angle. In another photo, charred remains, barely recognizable as human, lie splayed in the dirt.
On his Telegram account, Zelenskyy denounced the attack, which struck a city about 110 miles southwest of the capital, Kyiv, far from the front lines in eastern Ukraine. He called it “an open act of terrorism” against civilians.
He shared video footage from the area that showed blackened buildings, burned-out vehicles and emergency personnel working at the scene.
Ukrainian officials accused Russia of striking a target with no military value. Margarita Simonyan, editor in chief of state-sponsored media RT, said Russia’s Ministry of Defense told her the Vinnytsia strike hit a military officers’ club. The Washington Post could not verify the claim.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba accused Russia of committing “another war crime.” He tweeted a video from the scene that appeared to show an overturned stroller lying on the debris-littered street, as a casualty is wheeled on a stretcher and flames billow from the site of the attack.
Images taken by journalists at the scene show emergency responders sifting through the rubble around a blackened building with blown-out windows, as charred husks of cars sit on the street outside. Some of the vehicles are stained with blood.
International law forbids deliberately targeting civilian sites or attacks that cause disproportionate civilian casualties given the military objective.
“We will put Russian war criminals on trial for every drop of Ukrainian blood and tears,” Kuleba wrote on Twitter.
The attack came as officials from Ukraine, the European Union and the United Nations gathered at The Hague on Thursday for a conference on accountability for war crimes in Ukraine, hosted by Dutch Foreign Minister Wopke Hoekstra, International Criminal Court Prosecutor Karim A.A. Khan and E.U. Commissioner for Justice Didier Reynders.
The gathering aims to coordinate the slew of efforts by international and domestic actors to investigate and prosecute alleged war crimes committed during the war in Ukraine. In a video address to attendees, Zelenskyy cast the conference as a watershed moment for international law.
“Right now it depends precisely on our joint efforts whether humanity will have such a tool as international law at all,” he said. “Whether humanity will live in chaos and constant violence from those who believe that force allegedly decides everything and that aggression allegedly allows any wishes of tyrants to be served under the guise of law.”
Invoking the attack on Vinnytsia, “an ordinary, peaceful city,” earlier that day, Zelenskyy called for a moment of silence for “the memory of all those killed by Russian crimes.” Assembled officials stood and bowed their heads.
Russian atrocities during its invasion of Ukraine - including the shooting of unarmed civilians, sexual violence and forced deportations - have prompted an unprecedented global effort to hold Russia accountable under international law, even as the fighting grinds on. Funding, resources and support has poured in to assist Ukrainian Prosecutor General Iryna Venediktova and investigators from the International Criminal Court, among other actors.
The array of probes has raised concerns about duplication and overlap, however. At Thursday’s conference, 45 countries, including the United States, signed a declaration to coordinate their investigations. They agreed to create an umbrella group to prevent duplication of efforts, train Ukrainian prosecutors and expand the number of forensic teams operating in Ukraine, Reuters reported. They also pledged $20 million to help the ICC.
Ukrainian courts have already convicted three Russian soldiers of war crimes, and the prosecutor general’s office has registered more than 22,000 more suspected war crimes. Meanwhile, a global movement to prosecute Russian President Vladimir Putin for the crime of aggression is growing, as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has turned attention to the issue of illegal war.
Ukrainian officials called Thursday for the establishment of a special tribunal to try Russia for its war of “aggression.”
Addressing diplomats, judicial authorities and prosecutors at the Ukraine Accountability Conference via video link, Kuleba said the legal “architecture” of the International Criminal Court alone was not enough and urged others to back the creation of an “ad hoc” special tribunal with “temporary jurisdiction” to look at crimes committed by Russia since the start of the invasion on Feb. 24. The ICC does not have jurisdiction to prosecute the crime of aggression.
“We call on our international partners to consider entering into agreement on the establishment of the special tribunal for the punishment of the crime of aggression against Ukraine,” Kuleba said. Zelenskyy said such a tribunal will “ensure the fair and lawful punishment” of Russian officials who started the war.
Hoekstra, the Dutch foreign minister, said the Netherlands would consider setting up an international Ukraine war crimes tribunal, according to Reuters.
European Union foreign affairs chief Josep Borrell also called out Russia’s “unjustified military aggression” and “violation of international law.”
“Let me be very clear the perpetrators of these unspeakable crimes must and will be held accountable,” he said.