How to Seek Justice for Rape in the War on Ukraine
On March 13, a Russian soldier broke into a school in Malaya Rohan, a village near the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, which had been relentlessly attacked by Vladimir Putin’s forces for weeks. Locals had congregated in the school’s basement for shelter from the violence. What followed, according to an account from a survivor published by Human Rights Watch, is horrifying but bears detailing.
The soldier ordered a 31-year-old woman to another floor of the building and proceeded to rape her repeatedly. He made her perform oral sex, and while she did, he held a gun at her head, or pointed it directly at her face. Twice, he shot at the ceiling. “He said it was to give me more ‘motivation,’” she told HRW.
When the seemingly endless attack was finally over, the soldier told the woman his name, his age, and declared himself Russian. Perversely, he also brazenly said that she “reminded
