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The NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) warned on Tuesday that Ukraine “would have to investigate” the “alleged use” of prohibited antipersonnel mines by its army.
According to Human Rights Watch, about 50 civilians, including five children, were injured in Ukraine by landmines. The country “would have to investigate the alleged use by its army of thousands of anti-personnel mines scattered by rockets in and around the city of Izium, when Russian forces occupied the area,” said HRW, referring to this town in the this Ukrainian, in Russian hands for more than five months.
The NGO also recalled that Russian forces have also used this type of mine in numerous regions of Ukraine since the start of their invasion, in February 2022.
In Izium, HRW documented many cases of Soviet-made “butterfly mines” being deployed by rocket fire. They were found in nine areas where Russian positions were located, which suggests that these were “the objectives”.
“Ukrainian forces appear to have intensively deployed mines in the Izium region, causing civilian casualties,” Steve Goose, director of the arms service at HRW, was quoted as saying in the report.
The “atrocities” committed by Russian forces “do not justify the use of these prohibited weapons” by Ukraine, it added.
The Ukrainian army regained control of Izium in mid-September. HRW carried out an investigation in the region from September 19 to October 9 and questioned more than a hundred witnesses. After that, he identified 11 mine victims.
However, the health services questioned by the NGO stated that about 50 civilians, including at least five children, were allegedly injured by these mines during or after the Russian occupation. Half of them suffered lower extremity amputations.
kyiv’s response
The Ukrainian Defense Ministry, contacted by the NGO for its report, stated that the army respected its international obligations, but indicated that the type of weapons used “would not be discussed until the end of the war.”
For his part, the Ukrainian commissioner for human rights, Dmytro Lubinets, indicated that “this problem (of antipersonnel mines) exists because Ukraine has been facing an enemy since 2014, an enemy that has a large number of weapons and uses its entire arsenal against our town”.
Ukraine is one of the signatories to the 1997 Mine Ban Convention, which it ratified in 2005, recalls HRW.
with AFP
