Mick Hartley

From the Telegraph:

Russian troops are carrying out a systematic campaign of illegal chemical attacks against Ukrainian soldiers, according to a Telegraph investigation.

The Telegraph spoke to a number of Ukrainian soldiers deployed in positions across the front line who detailed how their positions have been coming under near daily attacks from small drones, mainly dropping tear gas but also other chemicals.

The use of such gas, which is known as CS and commonly used by riot police, is banned during wartime under the Chemical Weapons Convention.

Ihor, the commander of a Ukrainian reconnaissance team who is deployed near the front line city of Chasiv Yar, in Donetsk Oblast, told The Telegraph: “Nearly every position in our area of the front was getting one or two gas grenades dropped on them a day.”…

Other types of chemical gas have also been reported, although the reports could not be independently verified by The Telegraph.

Ms Maciorowski said that she attended one incident last year caused by what she suspected was hydrogen cyanide, a deadly, colourless gas used as a chemical weapon by the West in the First World War.

A Russian drone dropped two munitions containing an unknown gas that had a “crushed almond aroma” on soldiers in Donetsk Oblast, she said.

Two people were killed and 12 required hospital treatment. In an interview with Le Monde in JanuaryYuriy Belousov, the head of investigations for Ukraine’s prosecutor general, referred to one of the deaths as being caused by an “unknown gas”.

There have also been reports of the use of chlorine and chloropicrin – a substance typically used as a pesticide that was deployed by the Germans as a chemical weapon in the First World War.

Officially the Ukrainian military has claimed that 626 gas attacks have been carried out by Russian forces since the start of the full-scale invasion.

But Ms Maciorowski believes this is almost certainly a gross underestimate, saying: “Sadly, as it stands right now, the causes of deaths of many Ukrainian soldiers are not properly investigated. There are just so many of them.”…

The Russians have made little effort to conceal their use of chemical attacks. The Black Sea Fleet’s 810th Naval Infantry Brigade boasted about the deployment of chemical weapons in a post on Telegram in December, posting a video of what it claimed were K-51 gas grenades being dropped on Ukrainian positions.

“Thanks to the head of the radiation, chemical and biological defence troops… for the weapons provided and their timely delivery,” the caption read.

Similarly, a news report aired on the Russian state television station Channel One in May 2023 contained explicit discussion of the issue. One Russian soldier said: “The enemy decided that using gas masks would help. The gas masks don’t help.”

Once upon a time this might have been something that the UN would have had issues with, but, with Putin and his friends in China ready to use their vetoes, that's not going to happen. Anyway…Israel. That's all that matters.