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Byline Times first reported on Russia's "human safari" attacks on Ukrainians back in July 2024. At the time, Putin's drones attacks on civilians in Kherson City seemed to be a series of isolated atrocities, too brutal to form a pattern. However, more than a year later, the "human safari" has been officially recognised not only as a war crime and a crime against humanity but also as part of a coordinated strategy to drive Ukrainians from their homes.
On 27 October 2025, the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine presented new findings to the 80th United Nations General Assembly, documenting a systematic campaign to depopulate southern Ukraine. This is the third report by the Commission and it builds upon previous findings. A conference room paper in May 2025 first documented drone attacks along a hundred-kilometre stretch around Kherson.
The new report expands the investigation to 300 kilometres, from Dnipropetrovsk through Kherson to Mykolaiv, and incorporates deportations and transfers into a broader picture of Russia's state-directed policy against civilians.
Drones as Instruments of Forced Displacement
The Commission confirmed that Russian forces committed the crimes against humanity of murder and forcible transfer of population through recurrent drone strikes across southern Ukraine. These attacks were coordinated and directed at civilians, homes, humanitarian distribution points, and critical energy infrastructure. First responders such as ambulances and fire brigades were also targeted, in defiance of their protected status under international law. The strikes rendered entire areas uninhabitable.
The Commission concluded that the use of drones was not random but part of a deliberate policy to depopulate Ukrainian territories, spreading terror and coercing civilians into flight. In Kherson, this pattern is clear. According to local authorities, since July 2024, over 200 civilians have been killed and over 2,000 civilians were injured in such attacks in the three oblasts. Almost 3,000 houses have been damaged or destroyed, also by drones.
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The Road of Death
Elvina Osmanova, a municipal services staffer in her early twenties, forgot her purse at home in Kherson as she set out on a business trip to Mykolaiv, a city 67 miles away. Before the Russian invasion, the drive took about an hour along a flat road lined with sunflower fields and southern steppes.
In August 2025, the road had turned into a surreal landscape. Elvina drove at a mad speed under fishing nets stretched high over wooden poles, forming a long, transparent tunnel. Her car twisted and turned around charred cars; black-and-red flames raged right next to her. The stench of burning fields and gasoline became suffocating. The fire was so close, and the heat so intense, that her windows began to crack. Was she trapped inside the anti-drone tunnel? Would a Russian FPV drone target her next? She saw the fishing nets melting and pressed harder on the gas. At a checkpoint, though, all traffic was stopped: swarms of Russian drones of different sizes and types attacked the M14 highway. Ukrainian electronic warfare (EW) units fought back, but the wait took what seemed to be forever.
Elvina made it back home only after curfew and had to stay and catch some sleep to the sounds of nonstop artillery fire. Before sunrise, now with her purse, she set out again - and soon a Russian drone dropped explosives 30 feet from her car. She saw people jumping out of burning vehicles and heard another explosion, but kept driving. She didn't know if she ...