When bombs turn medicine into a battlefield

By Fransiscus Nanga Roka

WHO should keep less stockpile coordinated, set up various nearby warehouses and require publishings test operational effects without revealing militarily delicate details. External sponsors should pay for hardened storage, mobile reserves and rapid replacement capabilities. An independently audited humanitarian deconfliction system must be in place after every strike.

Simply destroying a WHO medical warehoused with an air attack is not equivalent the same as smashing property. It can turn into a postponed ambush on every patient who subsequently arrives and finds no Trauma kit, anti-microbial or surgical tool accessible at the medical clinic.

As Russia ramped up its aerial attacks overnight September 3-4, one of WHO’s main warehouses in the west of Kyiv was hit. The warehouse was used for humanitairean medical supplies. Access was only granted after significant smoke had cleared and after safety issues were cleared up, however the extent of losses remained unclear, with reports suggesting no WHO staff injuries.

It was the third time since October that a WHO warehouse had been attacked. In August, a series of strikes destroyed its Dnipro warehouse when only 130 of around 300 pallets could be cleared. In 2026, WHO reports at least 20 humanitarian warehouses in Ukraine have been impacted, including 15 that store health-related supplies.

Now evidence, not words must show who launched the munition, what it was targeting, whether the warehouse was deliberately chosen and which commander ordered the operation. Public reporting frames the strike amidst Russian assaults, however timeline alone cannot create civil culpability.

However, the legal framework is unforgiving. Parties are required, under international humanitarian law (IHL), to distinguish between civilian objects and military objectives, refrain from attacks that may cause incidental loss of civilian life in excess of the direct military advantage anticipated, and to take all feasible precautions including verification of the target. Emphasis is placed on the increased protection of medical units and humanitarian assistance operations.

A warehouse dedicated to holding medical supplies would not be rendered a lawful target simply by the absence of patients or operating rooms. The law is not limited to the end of a medical chain but protects the whole thing. And the lack of immediate casualties does not diminish the damage: Bombing supplies can predictably halt treatment hundreds of kilometers away and weeks later.

But legal precision matters. Not quote unquote “absolute” metaphysically: protection is powerful. The same facility can, however, be stripped of that protection if it is used for purposes harmful to the enemy (other than humanitarian) and only after an effective warning has been posed and ignored. Proportionality and precautions are still obligations, though. At present, there is no public evidence of misuse like that here.

Could this be a war crime? Yes—but not automatically. Rome Statute, art. 8: War Crimes of the ND on Individual Responsibility at Sea and Reassessment of the Joint Report by State and Humanitarian Agencies The object is a protected property, the perpetrator had knowledge and intent to starve, but also a competing claim in conflict with personal responsibility. But, if the warehouse was not specifically hit by design, investigators still need to analyze whether at minimum, it was a matter of indiscriminate attack on civilians or an incommensurate one, including acts committed without all prior precautions possible.

Investigations are only heightened by the pattern. Data covering the period from February 2022 to December 2025 show that WHO documented at least 2,881 attacks on healthcare in Ukraine, and increasing numbers of medical warehouses attacked – three times more during 2025. (who.; Repeat for more than six times does not alone establish a central policy, but it annihilates the believability of claiming that each occurrence is a bewildering accident.

Ukraine and WHO must systematically secure satellite imagery, radar data, previous warning of warehouse coordinates to belligerents, inventory records, CCTV footage as well as munition fragments and witness testimony. The information and evidence should be provided securely to Ukrainian prosecutors, the ICC and the UN Commission of Inquiry.

WHO should keep less stockpile coordinated, set up various nearby warehouses and require publishings test operational effects without revealing militarily delicate details. External sponsors should pay for hardened storage, mobile reserves and rapid replacement capabilities. An independently audited humanitarian deconfliction system must be in place after every strike.

Finally, prosecutors need to trace the chain of command and not just identify the weapon. The crime scene is now a blown-up warehouse; the growing explosion radius of ruined medicine.

Fransiscus Nanga Roka is of the Faculty of Law, University 17 August 1945 Surabaya and Managing Partner Law Firm Victorious Indonesia.