The Future of War Crimes Today, Daily Brief 3 June, 2025.

Back in September last year, Anastasia Pavlenko, was riding her bicycle. The 23-year-old mother of two was heading for an appointment in the city of Kherson in southern Ukraine.

As she was cycling along, she saw a drone take off from the roof of a house. It started to follow her.

The drone followed Pavlenko for nearly 300 meters. It moved closer, chasing her. Then, the drone dropped something a few meters to the left of her.

An explosion injured Pavlenko in her neck, in her left leg, and under her rib.

Covered in blood, she somehow kept moving. Her bike’s tires were flat, but she wanted to get to an underpass just ahead. There, she might at least have some cover from the hunters above.

The next day, a video of the attack was uploaded to a Telegram channel affiliated with the Russian military.

The drone assault on Pavlenko is just one of several hundred such Russian attacks on civilians and civilian objects in Kherson since June 2024. Russian forces are using small, easily maneuverable – even commercially available – quadcopter drones armed with explosive weapons.

Sometimes it’s a grenade. Sometimes an antipersonnel landmine. Sometimes it’s an incendiary weapon, that is, a bomb meant to burn.

The drones send live video feeds back to their operators, who may be up to 25 kilometers away.

These are deliberate attacks on civilians, that is, war crimes. And the perpetrators film their war crimes and share the videos on social media. Russian forces are apparently proud of the atrocities they’re committing and the terror they’re spreading. 

Indeed, spreading terror among civilians seems to be the point.

Russian forces once occupied Kherson, but they were later pushed back across the river. No longer physically on the ground, through these attacks they make clear to Kherson’s residents that they’re still present, that they can target and kill the population at will.

Making people afraid to leave their homes by hunting them individually – in what some locals darkly label a “human safari” – is certainly a way to maintain terror.

Beyond the maimings and deaths, it’s having an additional impact, as well. In the two areas of Kherson Russian drones have been targeting in this way, many people have been forced out. Deliberate depopulation through fear.

Russian forces may be showing the world something of the future of war crimes here, combining inexpensive drones, explosives, and social media, to spread terror and kill civilians.

And the future is now: people living in deadly fear of a buzzing from above.

Human Rights Watch has a new web feature on Russian drone attacks in Kherson, Ukraine, which includes selections from some of the videos mentioned above. It’s difficult viewing, but I encourage you to look at this special report.