A Russian bombing of an aid centre in southeastern Ukraine has killed 24 people, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Monday. The strikes destroyed a school being used as a humanitarian hub in the village of Komyshuvakha in the Zaporizhia region, and five other people were injured.
"After the first air strike, there was a repeat strike with nine more bombs, directly on the shelter where people were gathered," Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram. He said Russian forces must have known that residents who remained in the village collected aid there every week, calling the attack further proof that Russia wants neither de-escalation nor real justice.
Regional governor Mykhailo Semikin said the dead included a police officer and two emergency service rescuers. Footage released by Ukraine's emergency services showed the building reduced to smouldering rubble as rescuers searched the site. There was no immediate comment from Russia on the attack.
Zelenskyy said a humanitarian operation in Oleshky had briefly suggested that progress towards peace was possible, but that with these killings Russia was "sending an entirely opposite signal". Elsewhere, drone strikes injured 12 people in the Kharkiv region and five in Odesa, while Russia's defence ministry said it had shot down 212 Ukrainian drones overnight.