MOSCOW, October 21. /TASS/. Russia’s Human Rights Commissioner Tatyana Moskalkova said on Friday she has turned to a number of international organizations in regard to the Ukrainian military’s deadly shelling of a ferry crossing the Dnieper River in Kherson.
"This is another tragedy resulting in the deaths of civilians and journalists," Moskalkova wrote on her Telegram channel. "On the morning of October 21, the Ukrainian army attacked a civilian ferry near the Antonovka Bridge in Kherson. Several people were killed and many more sustained wounds."
According to her, "it was an unprecedented and egregious crime against humanity" directly aimed at slaughtering civilians.
"I have turned to international bodies and human rights protection organizations because it is high time to put an end to this lawlessness," she added.
Meanwhile, Valery Fadeyev, head of the Russian Presidential Council for the Development of Civil Society and Human Rights, said he already submitted inquiries to the United Nations, the OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe) and the Council of Europe urging them to react to the assault on the ferry in the Kherson Region.
"Today, I submitted inquiries with the UN, the OSCE, the Council of Europe and Amnesty International requesting a prompt reaction to this blatant war crime on behalf of Kiev," he stated. "For decades, Western institutions have been persistently teaching us how to respect human rights."
"And what have these ‘teachers’ turned out to be? The dismissal of Kiev’s war crimes boldly speaks to the vested interest of the leading international structures, which were originally designed to protect and promote human rights," he added.
The Ukrainian military delivered 12 rocket strikes on the civilian river crossing in Kherson in the late evening of October 20, with 11 rockets shot down by Russian air defenses and one rocket falling in the area of the Antonovka Bridge. Four civilians were killed and ten others were wounded as a result of the Ukrainian army’s bombardments.
Yekaterina Gubareva, Kherson Region deputy governor, said earlier on Friday that two staff members of the Kherson-based Tavria TV company were killed in the Ukrainian army’s shelling of a ferry across the Dnieper River in Kherson.
On October 20, the Kherson Region’s Acting Governor Vladimir Saldo announced that civilians living on the right bank of the Dnieper River would be evacuated to the left bank due to the risk of flooding in the event that the Ukrainian military attacked the Kakhovka Hydroelectric Power Plant. He also said that Ukraine had been amassing huge forces near the cities of Nikolayev and Krivoy Rog so efforts to establish major defenses were another reason for the relocation of civilians.
The acting governor mentioned plans to temporarily resettle 50,000 to 60,000 people. A ferry service from the port of Kherson to the Golaya Pristan and Alyoshki settlements was launched on October 19.
From September 23 to September 27, the DPR and the LPR as well as the Kherson and the Zaporozhye Regions held referendums where the majority of voters opted to join Russia. On September 30, Russian President Vladimir Putin and the heads of the four regions signed treaties on their accession to Russia.
On October 5, President Putin signed laws on ratifying the accession of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR) as well as of the Zaporozhye and Kherson Regions to Russia following a granted approval from both houses of the Russian parliament - the State Duma and the Federation Council.