Two weeks after Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine in February, Kremlin-backed rebels attacked a nursing home in the eastern Luhansk region. Dozens of elderly and disabled patients, many of them bedridden, were trapped inside without water or electricity. The March 11 attack sparked a fire that spread throughout the facility, suffocating people who were unable to move. A small number of patients and staff escaped and took refuge in a nearby forest, eventually receiving help after walking 5 kilometers (3 mi). In a war full of atrocities, the attack on the nursing home near the village of Stara Krasnianka stood out for its cruelty. Ukrainian authorities blamed Russian forces, accusing them of killing more than 50 vulnerable civilians in a brutal and unprovoked attack. But a new UN report found that Ukraine’s armed forces bear a large, and perhaps equal, share of responsibility for what happened in Stara Krasnyanka, which is about 580 kilometers southeast of Kiev, the Ukrainian capital. A few days before the attack, Ukrainian soldiers took up positions inside the nursing home, effectively making the building a target. At least 22 of the 71 patients survived the attack, but the exact number of people killed remains unknown, according to the United Nations. The report by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights does not conclude that Ukrainian soldiers or Moscow-backed separatist fighters committed a war crime. But he said the battle at the Stara Krasnyanka nursing home is emblematic of the human rights office’s concerns about the possible use of “human shields” to prevent military operations in some areas. The aftermath of the attack on Stara Krasnyanka’s home also provides a window into how both Russia and Ukraine are moving quickly to define the narrative of how events are unfolding on the ground, even as those events may still be obscured by the fog of war For Ukraine, maintaining the upper hand in the battle for hearts and minds helps ensure the continued flow of billions of dollars in Western military and humanitarian aid. Russia’s often indiscriminate bombing of apartment buildings, hospitals, schools and theaters was the main cause of thousands of civilian casualties in the war. Ukraine and its allies, including the United States, blamed Moscow for the deaths and injuries and called for those responsible to be brought to justice. But Ukraine must also comply with international battlefield rules. David Crane, a former US Defense Department official and veteran of several international war crimes investigations, said Ukrainian forces may have violated the laws of armed conflict by not evacuating residents and staff at the nursing home. “The basic rule is that civilians cannot be deliberately targeted. Period. For whatever reason,” Crane said. “The Ukrainians put these people in a situation that was a killing zone. And you can’t do that.” The Associated Press and the PBS series “Frontline,” drawing from multiple sources, have independently documented hundreds of attacks across Ukraine that may constitute war crimes. The vast majority of them appear to have been committed by Russia. However, a handful, including the destruction of the Stara Krasnyanka care home, point to Ukrainian militants also being responsible. Early media reports on the Stara Krasnyanka nursing home largely reflected statements issued by Ukrainian officials more than a week after the fighting ended. Serhiy Haidai, the governor of Luhansk, said in a March 20 post on his Telegram account that 56 people were “cynically and deliberately” killed by “Russian occupiers” who “fired at close range from a tank.” The office of Ukraine’s general prosecutor, Iryna Venediktova, said in a statement issued the same day that 56 elderly people died due to the “treacherous actions” of Russian forces and their allies. Neither statement said whether Ukrainian soldiers had entered the house before the fighting began. The Luhansk regional administration, which Haidai leads, did not respond to requests for comment. Ukraine’s attorney general’s office told the AP on Friday that the Luhansk branch continues to investigate Russia’s “indiscriminate shelling and forcible transfer of persons” from the nursing home. About 50 patients were killed in the attack, the office said, fewer than it had said in March. The attorney general’s office did not immediately respond to the UN report, but said it was also looking into whether Ukrainian troops were at the home. Moscow-backed separatists have been fighting Ukrainian forces for eight years in the mainly Russian-speaking eastern industrial heartland of Donbas, which includes the Luhansk and Donetsk regions. They have declared two independent “people’s” republics, which Russia recognized shortly before the war began. Viktoria Serdyukova, human rights commissioner for Luhansk’s separatist government, said in a March 23 statement that Ukrainian troops were responsible for the deaths at the nursing home. Residents had been taken hostage by Ukrainian “militants” and many of them were “burnt alive” in a fire lit by the Ukrainians as they retreated, he said. The UN report examined violations of international human rights law that have occurred in Ukraine since Russia’s February 24 invasion. The attack on Stara Krasnianka comprises only two paragraphs in the 38-page report. Although brief, this short section is the most detailed and independent examination of the incident that has been made public. The Stara Krasnyanka department is relying on testimonies from staff who survived the attack and information provided by relatives of residents, according to a UN official who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights is still working to fully document the case, the official said. Among the questions that remain are how many people were killed and who they were. In early March, according to the United Nations report, “as active hostilities moved closer to the care home,” his administration repeatedly asked local authorities to evacuate residents. However, the evacuation was not possible because Ukrainian forces were believed to have mined the surrounding area and blocked roads, the report said. The house is built on a hill and is close to a main highway, which made the location of strategic importance. On March 7, Ukrainian soldiers entered the nursing home, according to the U.N. Two days later, they “engaged in an exchange of fire” with Moscow-backed separatists, “although it remains unclear which side opened fire first,” the report said. . No staff or residents were injured in this first exchange. As of March 11, 71 residents and 15 employees remained at home without access to water or electricity. That morning, Luhansk separatist forces, which the UN described as “armed groups linked to Russia”, attacked with heavy weapons, the report said. “A fire started and spread throughout the nursing home while fighting continued,” according to the UN. , according to the UN A correspondent for the state-run Russia-1 news channel gained access to the war-torn house after the battle and posted a video on his Telegram account in April accusing Ukrainian soldiers of using “helpless old people” as human shields. Correspondent Nikolai Dolgachev was accompanied into the building by a man identified in the video as a Luhansk separatist soldier who goes by the call sign “Wolf.” The extensive damage to the building, both inside and out, can be seen in the video. A body is on the floor. The AP verified the location in the video Dolgachev posted is the care home by comparing it to other videos and photos of the building. Dolgachev said Ukrainian troops set up a “machine gun nest” and an anti-tank weapon in the house. In the video, he pauses among the rubble inside the building to rest his hand on the anti-tank weapon, which he mistakenly named Tor. The Tor is a Russian-made surface-to-air missile. Ian Williams, a military expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, reviewed the video and said the weapon is an RK-3 Corsar, a Ukrainian-made man-portable anti-tank guided missile. While the opposing sides blame each other for the Stara Krasnyanka tragedy, the grim reality is that much of the war in Ukraine is being fought in populated areas, increasing the potential for civilian casualties. These deaths and injuries become almost inevitable when civilians are caught in the line of fire. “The Russians are the bad guys (in this conflict). That’s pretty clear,” Crane said. “But all are accountable to the law and the laws of armed conflict.”
