Geneva, Switzerland
Reuters
More than 8,000 civilians have been recorded killed in Ukraine since Russia invaded nearly a year ago, the UN human rights office said on Tuesday, describing the figure as only the “tip of the iceberg” with thousands more thought to have died.
The latest toll represents a significant upward revision from the previous tally, released earlier this month, of 7,199 recorded killed since the start of Moscow’s full-scale invasion on 24th February, 2022. Around 90 per cent of the victims were killed by explosive weapons, it added.
Damaged glasses lie on the ground at a bus station destroyed after a shelling, amid Russia’s attack on Ukraine, in Kherson, Ukraine, on 21st February, 2023. PICTURE: Reuters/Lisi Niesner
“Our data are only the tip of the iceberg. The toll on civilians is unbearable,” UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Turk said in a statement.
Matilda Bogner, head of United Nations Human Rights Mission in Ukraine, said it believes thousands of civilian deaths remained to be counted, many of them in the southern Ukrainian city of Mariupol, now under Russian control.
The UN tally includes 2,000 civilian deaths in Mariupol, which was home to around 450,000 people before Russia laid siege to it for three months and blasted it to the ground.
We rely on our readers to fund Sight's work - become a financial supporter today!
For more information, head to our Subscriber's page.
“We have uncorroborated information indicating that the numbers are thousands higher than we have documented and a huge number of those are from Mariupol,” Bogner told reporters.
Russia denies intentionally targeting civilians in what it calls a “special military operation”.
