Yet it's Democrats wrapping themselves in the blue and yellow rag that bans opposition political parties, silences the press, assassinates the children of their critics, murders POWs, and tortures prisoners. Any sensible person wouldn't want any association with either country, yet here we are. Not our problem, and certainly not a country to send our tax dollars.
en.wikipedia.org
As of January 1, 2020, there are 349 officially registered political parties in Ukraine.
en.wikipedia.org
The Russian Federation has a de jure multi-party system, however it operates as a near de facto one-party system. As of 2020 six parties have members in the federal parliament, the State Duma, with one dominant party
en.wikipedia.org
Numerous war crimes were recorded, including murder, torture, abductions,
deportation,
looting,
rape against Ukrainian women,
terrorism, attacks on civilians, unlawful airstrikes or attacks against civilian objects, unlawful confinement, threats of violence, and inhumane treatment of
POWs.
[93]
Civilians killed in
Bucha, April 2022
Among the targets of Russian airstrikes was Ukraine's capital
Kyiv, a city of some 3 million people.
[94] Kindergartens and orphanages were also shelled.
[95] Russian forces were accused of a campaign of
terror against Ukrainians.
[96] On March 3, 2022, Russian forces were reportedly
looting across
Kherson.
[97] During the
Siege of Mariupol, the city was destroyed by shelling and cut off from electricity, food and water. A 6-year old girl was reported to have died from
dehydration under the ruins of her home in Mauripol on March 8.
[98] During the
assault on Irpin, the Russian forces
indiscriminately fired at refugees trying to flee across a collapsed bridge. A family of four was killed by a mortar strike.
[99][100]
During the
Battle of Kharkiv, the city was destroyed by Russian shelling, including a boarding school for blind people. Out of a population of 1.8 million, only 500,000 people remained in Kharkiv by March 7.
[101] On February 28, 2022, a
Russian cluster bomb attack killed 9 civilians and wounded 37 more in Kharkiv.
[102][103] On 3 March,
47 civilians were killed in Chernihiv, most of whom were standing in line at a food store, waiting for bread, when a Russian air strike with eight
unguided aerial bombs hit them.
[104] In the
Mariupol hospital airstrike, three people were killed, including a young girl;
[105] whereas hundreds died in the
Mariupol theatre airstrike, used as an
air raid shelter.
[106] Following the withdrawal of Russian forces from the
E-40 highway around the Kyiv area, BBC News discovered 13 dead bodies left lying on the road, only two wearing Ukrainian military uniforms. The evidence points to Russian soldiers killing these fleeing civilians.
[107]
After the Russian forces left the area of
Bucha after a month of occupation, on April 1–3 photos and videos emerged showing hundreds of killed people lying on the streets or in mass graves. The event triggered an international response as it was widely covered by journalists as the
Bucha massacre.
[108]
Thousands of civilians were killed by Russia's indiscriminate shelling and missiles strikes against civilian areas: in
Borordianka,
[110] Kramatorsk,
[111] Vinnytsia,
[112] Chasiv Yar,
[113] Serhiivka,
[114] and others. A Ukrainian official said that Russia is using mobile crematoriums to dispose of bodies in Mariupol in an attempt to cover up evidence of war crimes and hide the number of people that have died.
[115] On 7 May 2022, the
Bilohorivka school bombing killed dozens of people sheltering in the basement.
[116] Odessa was bombed continuously for months.
[117] On 15 June 2022, OHCHR expressed concerns over reports that Ukrainian children were forcibly deported to Russia, where they were being sent for rushed adoption, stating that these "do not appear to include steps for family reunification or respect the best interests of the child".
UNICEF similarly declared that "adoptions should never occur during or immediately after emergencies".
[118]
Izium mass grave exhumations, September 2022
Russian filtration camps were set-up to detain, interrogate and torture Ukrainians suspected to have connections with
Ukrainian government.
[119] On 14 July 2022,
OSCE released a report finding that Russia was guilty of murder, rape, abduction and
deportations of Ukrainian civilians, including the
transfer of 2,000 children from orphanages and institutions to Russia, even though many have relatives in Ukraine, which qualifies as a widespread and systematic attack against a civilian population, and is a crime against humanity.
[120]
On 14 September, Ukrainian authorities discovered a mass grave with 440 corpses in
Izium after the Russian forces withrdrew from the area.
[123] The events were described as the
Izium massacre. Since October-November, Russian forces used missiles and drones to systematically attack Ukraine's
electrical grids, leaving millions of civilians without
heating,
electricity, water, or other basic utilities during winter. These attacks on critical civilian infrastructure were deemed as illegal and as war crimes.
[124][125]
By March 30, the UN reported that 4 million refugees fled Ukraine, that 50 hospitals in the country were targeted, and that Russia used the banned cluster munition in at least 24 instances.
[126] Russia's attack against Ukraine forced 11.5 million people to flee their homes,
[127] sparking the
largest refugee crisis of the 21st century.
[128] On April 22, the UN recorded at least 2,343 killed civilians, of which 92.3% were attributable to the Russian armed forces.
[129] By November, the UN recorded 6,595 killed civilians.
[130]
www.c-span.org
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