The Syrian Observatory For Human Rights

What’s behind Russia’s history of atrocities

Consider the Russian means of battle throughout the previous a long time, from Afghanistan to Chechnya to Syria. All these wars had been characterised by mass casualty assaults in opposition to civilians by the Russians, in addition to credible allegations of the abstract executions of civilians by Russian forces.

In the Eighties, the Soviet Union waged a nine-year battle in Afghanistan throughout which period Human Rights Watch reported, “Over one million Afghan civilians are believed to have been killed … most in aerial bombardments. Tens of thousands have disappeared — many of them the victims of summary executions. …”
The atrocities continued within the following decade, this time nearer to residence. During Russia’s first battle in Chechnya in 1994, in line with Russian human rights specialists, round 25,000 civilians died throughout simply two months of preventing within the capital, Grozny.
During the second Russian battle in Chechnya, Russian troopers summarily executed at the least 38 civilians in Grozny between late December 1999 and mid-January 2000, in line with Human Rights Watch. And on February 5, 2000, Russian troopers summarily executed “at least sixty civilians,” the group added.
The International Federation for Human Rights found the Russians in Chechnya in 2000 had engaged in “summary executions and murders, physical abuse and torture; intentionally causing grave harm to people not directly involved in hostilities; deliberate attacks on the civilian population. …”
During their two wars in Chechnya, the Russians flattened Grozny, as soon as a metropolis of greater than 400,000 folks. Indeed, the United Nations once declared Grozny the “most destroyed city on Earth.”
More just lately throughout the Syrian civil battle — a battle that Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad was in peril of dropping earlier than Russia intervened in 2015 — 8,683 civilians had been killed by Russian bombardments, in line with the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Atrocities will not be solely dedicated by Russia’s typical forces. Last yr the European Union imposed sanctions on the Russian mercenary group the Wagner Group, which operates as a proxy for the Russian authorities and army. The sanctions associated to “serious human rights abuses, including torture and extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions,” the EU said, citing the Wagner Group’s actions in Libya, Syria and the Central African Republic. The Wagner Group has reportedly deployed 1,000 of its males to Ukraine.

What we’re seeing in Bucha now’s the Russian means of battle at work, which appears designed to bludgeon civilian populations into submission, in order to expunge any potential resistance. Unfortunately, we will count on to see extra Buchas in coming weeks.

 

 

Source:   Pehal News