In the video, which the news agency AFP has not yet been able to verify, a man tries to hide behind a vehicle from a remotely controlled FPV drone chasing him before its explosive charge detonates.
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The man, a street market vendor in Kherson, “sustained injuries but survived,” reported Yaroslav Shanko, head of the Kherson city military administration, on the Telegram platform.
According to the Ukrainian police, the 52-year-old man suffered blast injuries and a concussion, with shrapnel wounds.
“This is how the Russians ‘fight.’ They deliberately hunt civilians,” the police said in a statement posted on social media.
“This barbaric Russian war crime in Kherson demands international condemnation and justice,” said Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha on the X network.
“It is a deliberate and systematic Russian strategy (…). The sadist controlling this drone knows perfectly well that he is targeting a civilian,” he added.
Ukrainian Ombudsman Dmytro Lubinets said the “video shows the true Russian tactic: to pursue and kill innocent people.”
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“The world must watch without looking away. This is how Russia hunts civilians,” said D. Lubinets.
Kherson, which had about 280,000 residents before the war, was controlled by Russia from March to November 2022.
Russian forces, now deployed on the opposite bank of the Dnipro River flowing through the city, regularly attack it, especially with drones.
The United Nations reported that civilian deaths increased in this war in 2026. The four-and-a-half-year-long war continues with no signs of a peace agreement.
Russian officials also regularly accuse Kyiv of deliberately targeting civilians with drones, especially in regions bordering Ukraine.
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