A column of Russian military vehicles outside Berezivka, 40km west of Kyiv, was identified, targeted and destroyed in late February, thanks to intelligence provided by a 15-year-old schoolboy.
Responding to the Ukrainian army’s appeals to help spot Russian troop movements, Andrii Pokrasa sneaked into a field one night and tracked down the column with his personal drone. His father entered the GPS co-ordinates into a social media app. Ukrainian artillery then pinpointed the Russian convoy. The experience was “very, very scary”, Pokrasa told Global News, but he was determined that the Russians would not occupy his town.
Pokrasa is one of about 1,000 civilian drone operators contributing to Ukraine’s extraordinarily courageous and ingenious defence. They do so at extreme personal risk. There have been several reports of Russian forces shooting civilians as suspected spies. Independent security experts have also warned about the dangers of blurring the lines between civilians and combatants, calling for the laws of war to be updated.