Pokalchuk explained her reasons in The Washington Post on 13 August, stating her view that "the report's deepest flaw was how it contradicted its main objective: [f]ar from protecting civilians, it further endangered them by giving Russia a justification to continue its indiscriminate attacks."

In her judgment, Amnesty International Crisis Team researchers at the time had "exceptional training and experience in human rights, laws of war, weapons analysis" but "often lack[ed] [a] knowledge of local languages and context.

[2] In 2019, Pokalchuk stated that Russian authorities would not be able to prevent the International Criminal Court preliminary examination of possible war crimes that occurred in Ukraine starting with the Revolution of Dignity in late 2013 and early 2014 from proceeding through into a full investigation.

[8] In 2020, Pokalchuk stated that Amnesty International had documented gender-based and domestic violence in eastern parts of Ukraine added to the stress of the war in Donbas.

[9] Pokalchuk described the September 2021 arrest of Nariman Dzhelyal, deputy head of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People, to be based on a fabricated case, stating that the prosecution was to prevent independent civil society from functioning in Crimea.