At approximately 11am on March 26th 2022, Russian forces reportedly shelled the town of Barvinkove in the Izyum district of Kharkiv, resulting in the deaths of at least four Ukrainian soldiers and one civilian, as well as causing a fire in a secondary school. Multiple Ukrainian news sources, and a number of posts on Telegram reported the attack and the deaths of the four personnel members and one civilian. All the reports stated that the number of civilian injuries was to be determined, with no source giving a figure. The fire in the secondary school, also referred to as a lyceum, was subsequently extinguished.

Investigators for the State Security Service of Ukraine, under the procedural leadership of the Kharkiv Regional Prosecutor’s Office have launched a pre-trial investigation into the alleged attack for violating the laws and customs of war, combined with intentional murder as per Part 2 of Article 438 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.

Perviy Kharkovskyi, a presumably Ukrainian Telegram channel with a clear pro-Russian stance and Kharkov Nash Telegram channel, a Ukrainian channel based in Kharkiv with local correspondents in the city, both claimed that the school was being used by Ukrainian forces to create a ‘human shield’ for the Ukrainian soldiers, therefore attempting to shift the blame onto Ukrainian forces by suggesting they had broken the laws of war themselves. One of the sources, Kharkov Nash, identified five soldiers as being killed in the attack, without directly contesting that the civilian killed was actually a soldier.

This incident has ACLED’s reference code: UKR54576.