Russia is committing war crimes and crimes against humanity by intentionally attacking civilian infrastructure – including vital energy systems – in Ukraine, an independent UN investigations panel said on Monday.

Russian forces have been targeting Ukrainian power infrastructure since the early months of the war in 2022, and massively ramped up these attacks at the beginning of last year’s winter, leaving millions of Ukrainians freezing in the darkness of their homes.

A new report published by the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine on Monday and shared with CNN, said these attacks “were carried out with intent” and were in line with Russia’s “state policy to deprive the civilian population from essential energy supplies and cause suffering.”

“Russian commanders who were ordering these attacks knew that the heating facilities they targeted were indispensable to the civilian population, in particular during the winter,” the report, which is being submitted to the UN General Assembly, said.

CNN has approached the Kremlin for comment.

Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha said the report “confirms what Ukrainians have experienced for years: Russia’s systematic attacks on civilian energy infrastructure constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity.”

In a post on X, Sybiha said Russia “has deliberately deprived millions of people of electricity, heating and water, turning cold and darkness into instruments of war.”

Large-scale Russian drone and missile attacks last winter reduced Ukraine’s thermal power generation capacities by 70 per cent in the most affected areas, according to Kyiv. The suffering was made worse by an unusually cold winter with temperatures dropping to as low as -30 degrees Celsius (-22 F) on multiple occasions.

The commission was established by the UN’s Human Rights Council just days after Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

It has previously reported on other aspects of Russia’s war on Ukraine, including allegations of sexual and gender-based violence committed by Russian armed forces, and the wide-spread forced deportations of Ukrainian children by Russian authorities.

In this latest report, the commission describes the dire impacts of prolonged cold exposure on Ukrainian civilians, saying that the country’s medical authorities documented deaths caused by low temperatures in homes, and even in hospitals.

“Medical personnel from hospitals reported that during the past winter, they attended to patients who developed cold-related trauma, including various degrees of frostbite and hypothermia. The patients had developed these conditions at home, due to exposure to unheated premises and required hospitalization,” the report said.

The report quotes a civilian woman living in Dnipro, Ukraine’s fourth largest city, who describes the impact the Russian attacks had on her. “Cold—it paralyzes you; there’s simply no way to get warm, and terrifying thoughts come into your mind,” she said.

Blaming Putin and others

The UN commission report names several high-profile Russian officials as the people most responsible for what it describes as “war crimes and the crimes against humanity.”

It says Russian President Vladimir Putin made several “statements concerning instructions to commit attacks against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure.”

It also alleges that evidence collected over the past few years shows that Russia’s former Minister of Defence Sergei Shoigu and his successor Andrey Belousov, as well the Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov, have been responsible for planning and overseeing attacks.

The International Criminal Court has previously issued arrest warrants against Putin, Shoigu and Gerasimov for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity.

As the colder weather begins to arrive in Ukraine, Russia has made it clear it intends to continue to terrorize its neighbor

The report mentions a declaration made by the Russian Ministry of Defence in August, which announced attacks against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure and said: “In winter you will freeze.”

Ukraine is increasingly struggling to defend itself against these large-scale attacks because of a critical shortage of air defense missiles. Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has made repeated pleas with Kyiv’s western allies for more ammunition, specifically pointing to the upcoming winter as a major worry.

Kyiv had been targeting Russian oil and gas infrastructure, in efforts to hurt the Kremlin’s revenues from energy exports. However, it has eased these attacks after criticism from US President Donald Trump, who has blamed Ukraine for rising gas prices.

“Human trafficking”

The report released on Monday also investigated Russia’s methods of recruiting foreign nationals to serve in its armed forces, concluding they amount to human rights violations and trafficking.

CNN has reported extensively on Russia’s use of deception, bribery and blackmail to lure foreigners into joining its military. People from multiple countries in Africa,India and Latin America have described being promised jobs in Russia only to find themselves on the frontlines.

The commission said it found “compelling evidence” that Russian authorities, working with agents, have “trafficked persons from 29 countries, using deception or coercion, to recruit them in the Russian armed forces.”

It said the fact that Russia has used the same tactics to recruit people from multiple countries “demonstrates a high degree of coordination between agents operating around the world and the Russian authorities.“

“Promised payments and bonuses were usually diverted by recruiting agents and military commanders, passports and phones were often confiscated, and contacts between agents and families were interrupted, once the recruits were deployed to the front.”

The report concludes that Russia violated the recruits’ fundamental human rights, including the rights to life, freedom, health, and to be treated humanely.

The commission also investigated Ukraine’s recruitment of foreign nationals into its army and said that testimonies it collected showed that those joining the Ukrainian armed forces “did so knowingly and voluntarily,” understood the contracts they were signing and received salaries.

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