Volodymyr Kindrat and Lyubov, his wife, can no longer get the sound of flying drones out of their heads – a metallic, menacing hum that they’d heard for hours a few months ago. They were almost used to it when two drones carrying explosives suddenly attacked their home.

“I saw the drones attacking our garage,” recalls Volodymyr Kindrat. The garage door and the family’s car were badly damaged in the attack. “It was like the soldiers were playing a video game,” Lubov describes. “But in real life,” adds Volodymyr. “And with live targets,” adds his wife.

After this shock, Volodymyr and Lyubov left Berislav, their hometown, together with their adult daughter.

Between September 2023 and July 2024, Berislav was repeatedly attacked by Russian drones – Ukrainian authorities recorded a total of 120 attacks that left 16 dead and more than 130 injured, according to citizen reports.

DW’s investigative team spent months reviewing reports and publicly available information about Russian drone attacks. In this undertaking, and in particular in the analysis of the data, DW was supported by two non-governmental organizations: the Eyes-on-Russia-Project of the Center for Information Resilience and Mnemonic, which offered valuable archives on Ukraine.

Our team was unable to conduct investigations in Berislav itself, as Ukrainian police had banned entry into the city due to the constant threat of a Russian attack. From the analysis of the data, however, as well as from the interviews with eyewitnesses and experts, it appears that the Russian soldiers may have systematically used drones against civilians.

Since the Ukrainians recaptured Berislav in the fall of 2022, the Russian army has retreated to the opposite bank of the Dnieper and from there is attacking the city by all means and means. Much of Berislav has now been destroyed, and most of its once 11,000 residents have left the area – those who remain are overwhelmingly elderly.

The “kamikaze” drones with FPV technology

No later than autumn 2023, the number of drone attacks increased significantly in Berislav. These primarily used First Person View (FPV) drones, which are loaded with explosives.

These drones are equipped with a video camera. With the help of special glasses or through a monitor, the pilot follows their course in real time, thus being able to closely monitor the target of the attack and direct the drone much more precisely.

Both warring sides began to use FPV drones en masse especially from 2023. “At any given time there are probably tens of thousands of FPV drones operating over Ukraine,” points out Samuel Bedet, a member of the Russian Studies Program at the Center for Naval Analyses, a US think tank. thinking.

The pilot of the drone can also choose to either drop the explosive materials from a certain distance or direct the drone onto the respective target, where it also explodes.

Drones hunting civilians

Yevhen, who does not want to give his last name, was also targeted by a Russian drone. It was January, when the worker of the international organization World Central Kitchen was transporting food to Berislav. Returning from the city in his car, he was followed by a drone. “I don’t know how long he was chasing me,” Yevhen tells DW, relieved to have escaped. “I was very scared.”

Two French workers of the Swiss organization HEKS, however, were not so lucky: on February 1, both were killed by a drone attack in Berislav, while four other civilians were injured. And they were “chased by drones”, as one of the survivors mentioned.

“FPV drones never disappear, they are constantly flying over the city,” says Valery Bieli, deputy chief of the Berislav police. As we speak with him in a small village outside the range of the drones, Bjeli expresses a terrible suspicion: “In Berislav they practice – they train at the expense of civilians.”

Military and political objectives

International humanitarian law prohibits targeted attacks against civilians. Both senior military officials and ordinary soldiers are required to distinguish between military and civilian objectives. And of course, they must still “take all the necessary precautions in order to harm the civilian population as little as possible”, emphasizes British lawyer Wayne Jordash, who specializes in war crimes and offers legal advice to Ukrainian justice as well. “Drones are no exception.”

When it comes to high-precision weapons, such as FPV drones, with which the attacker can clearly see the target, “the margin for accidents, for accidental damage should be clearly smaller”, underlines the lawyer. When civilian targets are repeatedly hit by such weapons, then there is “a much clearer basis for war crimes.”

Attacks from the other side of the Dnieper

Who exactly is behind the drone attacks cannot be proven beyond doubt. But taking into account the average range and possible flight path of the drones, DW was able to identify where the attacks were most likely launched: from the area around the towns of Kakhovka and Nova Kakhovka, which are located across from Berislav, on the opposite side bank of the Dnieper – an area where many Russian units are located, which are proven to use drones.

One of them is the 10th Special Brigade, which is part of the Russian military intelligence service GRU. Although little is known about the activities of this particular unit, we do know this: last June the Kherson prosecutor’s office conducted an investigation against a soldier of the brigade after recording a conversation the soldier had with one of his superiors. The charge is that in May 2023 the soldier deliberately attacked two civilians with a drone in the Berislav area.

One Russian unit operating in Kakhovka is the 205th Motorized Brigade. Its members admit in discussions on the well-known messaging platform Telegram that they have carried out several drone attacks in Berislav, most of them targeting vehicles. One of the pilots reports on the same platform that there are no civilians in the area. According to Wayne Jordas, with this comment the Russian soldier incriminates himself, because it shows that he is not trying to avoid civilian casualties. Rather, it de facto “decides that each individual is a legitimate military target.”

Sanctions on drone producers

The company Aero-Hit is now producing a new kind of drone, “Weles” – which is being trialled by another Russian military unit, the volunteer battalion BARS-33, which is located on the bank of the Dnieper opposite Berislav and which was founded on the initiative of Vladimir Zaldo, commander of the Russian occupying authorities in Kherson.

The production takes place in Khabarovsk, a city in the Far Eastern District of Russia. Aero-Hit has close ties to Konstantin Basiuk, a Russian politician and staunch supporter of BARS-33. Bashiuk is also the representative of the illegally annexed Ukrainian region of Kherson in the Russian Federation Council in Moscow.

Sanctions have also been imposed against the Russian politician by the West, while in June the US Department of Finance imposed sanctions against Aero-Hit with the justification that “Weles drones are used against Ukrainian targets by Russian military forces located in Kherson”. .

The head of the company, Viktor Yatchenko, however assured that these sanctions will not affect production. The main customer for the purchase of these drones appears to be the volunteer battalion BARS-33. In any case, when Aero-Hit was confronted with the findings of this investigation, the company responded that it is “a non-military company” and that it “does not work with the Ministry of Defense”.

No official placement

Although drawing firm conclusions is impossible, our investigations demonstrate that the three aforementioned military units could be responsible for the drone attacks in Berislav.

DW asked the Russian Ministry of Defense, politicians Vladimir Zaldo and Konstantin Basiuk, the volunteer battalion BARS-33 and the administrators of two related channels on Telegram to take a position on the findings of the investigations. None of them answered our questions.

Editor: Matias Bellinger

Factchecking: Birgitta Silke

Legal advisor: Florian Wagenknecht

Edited by: Giorgos Passas