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Cristina Chi - Philstar.com
April 3, 2026 | 2:58pm
MANILA, Philippines — Before Russian forces blew up the Kakhovka Dam in southern Ukraine in June 2023 — flooding a whole city and displacing thousands — its state media ran a curious online campaign: it accused Ukraine of plotting to destroy the dam and warned of a catastrophic fallout.
Russia's attempts to pin the blame on Ukraine before and after the actual act were later debunked. But for Truth Hounds, a Ukrainian human rights organization documenting war crimes, it was an opportunity and a lesson.
"Since Russia did this disinformation campaign, and in this campaign, it's very clearly stated that the environmental consequences will be huge and tremendous, it was easier for us to say that even the ordinary soldier on the Russian side knew what he or she was doing," Dmytro Koval, co-executive director of Truth Hounds, told Filipino journalists at a roundtable at the Stratbase Institute in Manila on March 30.
"Russia conditioned with the disinformation campaign before the destruction happened," Koval added.
Russia's own false claim, in a way, had proven its foreknowledge.
Truth Hounds, founded in 2014, has since conducted over 260 field missions and identified more than 200 suspects in its quest to document atrocities in Ukraine. For its work, Russia designated it an "undesirable organization" last year.
Koval and co-executive director Oksana Pokalchuk visited Manila last month to discuss with experts how the Philippines' own struggles with accountability may relate to their own. Koval himself has previously studied the Philippines' 2016 arbitral tribunal victory over China for Ukraine's own maritime disputes with Russia.
Ukraine only became a party to the Rome Statute last year. The Philippines, Koval noted, has a much longer experience on investigating crimes against humanity.
"In here, you have crimes against humanity outside of armed conflict context," Koval said. "But still, many of the approaches to crimes against humanity investigation, but also tackling the consequences of crimes against humanity, are similar."
"There are so many overlaps, so many possibilities to learn from each other," he said.
Turn their propaganda into evidence
Russia's disinformation around the 2023 dam explosion is an example of how the spread of lies itself by one party may be part of the evidence of war crimes, Koval explained.
Koval explained that proving environmental war crimes is "extremely complicated" because prosecutors must show the attacking party knew the consequences.
But Russia's pre-attack propaganda — which spelled out the environmental devastation that would follow — did the work for them, he explained.
"This happens time and time again," Koval said.
Truth Hounds also applied the same logic to Russian attacks on journalists.
"Russia usually accompanied these attacks with saying that 'those are not journalists, those are mercenaries,'" Koval said.
But because the targets were well-known correspondents with public track records, the cover story proved the opposite: that Russia "intentionally targeted these journalists to prevent their reports."
"Disinformation sometimes also helps to build all kinds of basis," he said.
Tracking and documenting identities
When asked how the Philippines might hold Chinese vessel captains accountable for abuses in the West Philippine Sea, Koval shared Ukraine's experience with dealing with Russian ships.
Ukrainian prosecutors — specifically those of occupied Crimea — quietly tracked Russian vessels that had violated international law in the Sea of Azov and Black Sea.
"We had this precedent of getting the ship that violated international law, coming to Ukrainian ports like eight years later after it changed the name, changed the flag, and it was sure that Ukraine would not keep track of it," Koval said. "It's not easy, and it will trigger backlash from other countries and one particular country in your case. But still, it's doable."
Outside the ICC
Truth Hounds, Koval said, has also had to learn to look beyond the International Criminal Court.
After realizing the court "took ages" — the full investigation into Ukraine opened only in 2022, after 35 countries had demanded it — the organization looked elsewhere to file its war crimes and crimes against humanity cases against Russia.
There are at least 14 European Union member states that have initiated probes into international crimes committed by Russia.
"If you work in the accountability field, you should not rely only on one stakeholder," Koval said. "You always have to be conscious of many other ways to fight impunity."
Work the home court
Besides pursuing cases in other countries' courts, Truth Hounds also prioritizes getting cases into Ukrainian domestic courts, where a survivor of torture or sexual violence can receive formal recognition within a year. "We deliver some justice in place to the survivors," Koval said.
The organization has also learned and accepted that justice doesn't always come with an actual verdict.
When Truth Hounds brought survivors to speak before the UN Human Rights Council, the survivors felt a measure of justice with their opportunity to "[speak] freely to people who care," Koval said.
"That meant that Russia is not successful in silencing the truth," he added.
Truth Hounds has also supported a provisional reparations program that helps pay for survivors' sessions with psychologists or their medicines.
"The team now feels much more motivated," Koval said, "because they feel that within one month, we can see the result of improving health of the survivors."
