London, UK
Reuters
Russia’s 24th February invasion of Ukraine has left tens of thousands of dead, displaced millions and sown economic strife across the world.
Following are the main impacts of the war as it enters its seventh month:
Death
Since 24th February, 5,587 civilians have been recorded as killed and 7,890 as injured, though the actual casualties are much higher, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said on 22nd August
Most of those killed or injured were the victims of explosive weapons such as artillery, missile and air strikes, the OHCHR said.
Savelii, 10, mourns his father Ihor Krotkikh, 47, who according to his mother Alla Krotkikh, 42, was killed by shelling, as he stands by his grave during the death memorial weekend which marks a week after the Orthodox Easter, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine, at the cemetery in Irpin, outside Kyiv, Ukraine, on 1st May. PICTURE: Reuters/Zohra Bensemra.
Separately, the head of Ukraine’s armed forces, General Valeriy Zaluzhnyi, said on 22nd August that nearly 9,000 Ukrainian military personnel had been killed in the war, the first death toll provided by the military top brass since the invasion. He provided no details.
Russia has not said how many of its soldiers have been killed.
US intelligence estimates that some 15,000 Russian soldiers have been killed so far in Ukraine and three times that number wounded – equal to the total Soviet death toll during Moscow’s occupation of Afghanistan in 1979-1989.
The conflict in eastern Ukraine began in 2014 after a pro-Russian president was toppled in Ukraine’s Maidan Revolution and Russia annexed Crimea, with Russian-backed forces fighting Ukraine’s armed forces.
About 14,000 people were killed there between 2014 and the end of 2021, according to OHCHR, including 3,106 civilians.
Misery
Since 24th February, one third of Ukrainians – which has a population of more than 41 million – have been forced from their homes, the largest current human displacement crisis in the world, the United Nations Refuge agency has said.
There are currently more than 6.6 million refugees from Ukraine recorded across Europe, with the biggest numbers in Poland, Russia and Germany, according to the agency’s data.
Ukraine
Besides the human losses, Ukraine has lost control of around 22 per cent of its land to Russia since the 2014 annexation of Crimea, according to Reuters calculations.
It has lost a swathe of coastline, its economy has been crippled and some cities have been turned into wastelands by Russian shelling. Ukraine’s economy will contract by 45 per cent in 2022, the World Bank and International Monetary Fund have estimated.
The true dollar cost to Ukraine is unclear. Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said in July that the total rebuild after the war would cost approximately $US750 billion. It may be much more.
It is unclear how much Ukraine has spent on fighting.
A girl holds a doll as people wait to board a train to Dnipro and Lviv during an evacuation effort from war-affected areas of eastern Ukraine, in Pokrovsk, Ukraine, on 4th August. PICTURE: Reuters/Alkis Konstantinidis
Russia
The war has been expensive for Russia too – though it does not disclose the costs, which are state secrets.
Besides the military costs, the West has tried to punish Moscow by imposing severe sanctions – the biggest shock to Russia’s economy since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.
Russia’s central bank now forecasts that the $US1.8 trillion economy will contract by four to six per cent in 2022, less than the eight to 10 per cent contraction it forecast in April.
Still the impact on Russia’s economy is severe – and not yet fully clear. It has been excluded from Western financial markets, most of its oligarchs are sanctioned, and it is experiencing problems sourcing some items such as microchips.
Russia last month defaulted on its foreign bonds for the first time since the calamitous months following the 1917 Bolshevik revolution.
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Prices
The invasion and Western sanctions on Russia led to steep rises in the prices of fertiliser, wheat, metals and energy, feeding into both a brewing food crisis and an inflationary wave that is crashing through the global economy.
Russia is the world’s second largest oil exporter after Saudi Arabia and the world’s biggest exporter of natural gas, wheat, nitrogen fertiliser and palladium. Shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, international oil prices spiked to their highest levels since the records of 2008.
Attempts to reduce reliance on Russian oil, gas and oil products – or even to cap their prices – have exacerbated what is already the most severe energy crunch since the Arab oil embargo in the 1970s.
After Russia cut flows through the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline to Germany, prices for wholesale gas soared in Europe.
A complete cut off would tip the euro area into a recession, with sharp contractions in both Germany and Italy, according to Goldman Sachs.
A local resident walks past an apartment building heavily damaged during Ukraine-Russia conflict in the city of Sievierodonetsk in the Luhansk Region, Ukraine, on 1st July. PICTURE: Reuters/Alexander Ermochenko
Growth
The International Monetary Fund now forecasts the world’s economy will grow 3.2 per cent this year, down from 6.1 per cent last year, and significantly lower than its April forecast of 3.6 per cent, its January forecast of 4.4 per cent and its October forecast of 4.9 per cent.
Under a “plausible” alternative scenario that includes a complete cut-off of Russian gas supplies to Europe by year-end and a further 30 per cent drop in Russian oil exports, the IMF said global growth would slow to 2.6 per cent in 2022 and two per cent in 2023, with growth virtually zero in Europe and the United States next year.
Western weapons
The United States has provided about $US9.1 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since 24th February including stinger anti-aircraft systems, Javelin anti-armour systems, 155mm Howitzers and chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear protective equipment.
The next biggest donor to Ukraine is Britain, which £2.3 billion in military support. The European Union has agreed €2.5 billion in security assistance to Ukraine.
