Conflicts & War

UN: at least 726 civilians killed in 20 days of war in Ukraine

Geneva, Mar 16 (EFE).- At least 726 civilians have been killed and 1,174 injured in the first 20 days of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights said on Wednesday.

The causalities reported by the UN are verified but the real figure could be much bigger, it added in a statement.

The death toll includes at least 104 women and 52 children, while at least 77 women and 63 minors were injured, the OHCHR daily-updated data showed.

A total of 186 deaths were verified in regions held by both Ukrainians and pro-Russians in Donetsk and Lugansk.

The rest, 540, were reported in areas under the control of Kyiv in the rest of Ukraine, including the capital and towns such as Cherkasy, Chernihiv, Kharkiv, Kherson, Mykolaiv, Odesa, Sumy, Zaporizhzhia, Dnipropetrovsk and Zhytomyr.

The UN office fears that attacks in other areas that have not yet been verified, including those in besieged areas such as Izyum, Mariupol and Volnovakha, may have caused hundreds of victims.

Most of the causalities were a result of attacks with powerful explosive devices, including heavy artillery shelling and multiple rocket launch systems, OHCHR said.

International law considers indiscriminate military attacks against civilian targets such as residential buildings, schools or health facilities to be war crimes.

On March 4, the UN Human Rights Council approved a resolution to create a commission to investigate possible violations of international law committed by Russia in its invasion of Ukraine. EFE

abc/ta/mp

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