The United States called Thursday for an international war crimes investigation of Russia over its now two-week-old invasion of Ukraine, after the bombing of several Ukrainian hospitals sparked outrage this week.
Vice President Kamala Harris told reporters during a joint press briefing in Warsaw with Polish President Andrzej Duda that Russia’s conduct during the war should be investigated amid war crimes allegations.
“Absolutely there should be an investigation, and we should all be watching,” said Harris.
At the same press briefing, President Duda explicitly accused Russia’s military of war crimes.
“It is obvious to us that in Ukraine, Russians are committing war crimes.”
British Armed Forces Minister James Heappey also accused Russia of war crimes Thursday, specifically citing the bombing Wednesday of a hospital in the southeastern city of Mariupol.
“We ask ourselves the question how did this happen? Was it an indiscriminate use of artillery or missiles into a built-up area, or was a hospital explicitly targeted? Both are equally despicable, both, as the Ukrainians have pointed out, would amount to a war crime,” Heappey told the BBC.
Three people, including one child, were killed in the bombing, with at least 17 people injured, including a number of expecting mothers, children, and doctors.
The mayor of Zhytomyr, a city west of Kyiv, said that Russian bombs had struck two hospitals there.
According to the World Health Organization, 18 Ukrainian medical facilities have been hit since the Russian military invaded.