2.1 Overview

Human Rights Watch's investigation concluded that Georgian forces committed violations of the laws of war during their assault on South Ossetia. Our research shows that during the shelling of Tskhinvali and neighboring villages and the ground offensive that followed, Georgian forces frequently failed to abide by the obligation to distinguish between military targets that can be legitimately attacked, and civilians, who may not be targeted for attack. This was compounded by Georgia's failure to take all feasible measures to avoid or minimize civilian casualties. While we found no evidence that Georgian forces sought to deliberately target civilians, Human Rights Watch research concludes that Georgian forces demonstrated disregard for the protection of civilians during the shelling campaign, causing large-scale damage to civilian objects and property, and civilian casualties.

In the course of three missions to South Ossetia in August, September, and November 2008, Human Rights Watch interviewed more than 150 witnesses and survivors of the attacks on Tskhinvali and the ethnic Ossetian villages of Khetagurovo, Dmenisi, Sarabuki, Satikari, Gromi, Tbeti, Novyi Tbeti, Nizhnii Gudjabauri, Muguti, Monasteri, Batatykau, Kohat, Bikar, Tsinagari and Tsairi. Human Rights Watch researchers also examined the majority of sites where attacks took place, and gathered information from public officials, hospital personnel, and public activists.

The mere fact of civilian casualties or destruction of civilian objects does not mean that a violation of international humanitarian law occurred. Where civilian loss or damage occurred, what was important to seek to determine was whether there was evidence of a legitimate military target in the attack area, and how that target was attacked. In many cases Human Rights Watch researchers found no evidence of military objectives in the area under attack; other attacks did strike legitimate military targets, causing combatant and, in some cases, collateral civilian casualties.

In a number of cases, moreover, there were no direct witnesses and no reliable information regarding the circumstances of the attack. Also, since Georgian and Russian forces use some identical Soviet-era weapons systems including main battle tanks, Grad multiple-launch rockets, BMP infantry fighting vehicles, and tube artillery, Human Rights Watch could not always conclusively attribute specific battle damage to a particular belligerent, especially for the attacks that happened on and after the evening hours of August 8 when both Russian and Georgian troops were present in Tskhinvali. Human Rights Watch did not include such incidents in this report.

Yet many of the attacks on South Ossetia during the brief conflict can be clearly attributed to Georgian forces-based on witness accounts, the direction of the attack, and the timing of the damage in light of the advance of Georgian forces. Human Rights Watch has concluded that a number of these attacks were indiscriminate.

The massive shelling of Tskhinvali was indiscriminate because, as will be described below, at the very least the Georgian military effectively treated a number of clearly separated and distinct military objectives as a single military objective in an area that contained a concentration of civilians and civilian objects.

In some of the attacks investigated by Human Rights Watch, evidence suggests that the Georgian forces targeted lawful military objectives (that is, objects or persons making effective contribution to the military action) but the attacks may have been disproportionate, because they could have been expected to cause loss of civilian life or destruction of civilian property that was excessive compared to the anticipated military gain. In others, Georgian forces carried out a number of artillery attacks in which they failed to take all feasible precautions to minimize the likely extent of loss or injury to civilians.[119]

Georgia's use of multiple rocket launching systems, such as BM-21s ("Grads") in civilian populated areas violated international humanitarian law's principle of distinction. These weapons cannot be targeted with sufficient precision to be accurate against military targets, and their broad area effect makes their use incompatible with the laws of war in areas where civilians or civilian objects (such as schools or hospitals) are located. The use of such weapons in populated areas is indiscriminate by nature and thus prohibited under international humanitarian law.

Several Ossetian civilians reported looting by Georgian ground forces but otherwise generally did not complain of other abusive treatment during the ground offensive by Georgian troops.[120] Those detained by Georgian forces, however, reported they were ill-treated when taken into custody (see Chapter 2.8).