At least 18 people waiting to receive humanitarian aid in a Ukrainian village have been killed in a Russian attack that Ukraine’s leader has called “utterly horrific”.
Five people were injured and another 27 are still missing after at least nine 3,000kg aerial bombs hit the village of Komyshuvakha in the southern Zaporizhzhia region, regional head Mykhailo Semikin said.
President Volodymyr Zelensky said that after the first strike on the local school “used for humanitarian needs”, there was a second attack on the place where people were sheltering.
He posted a video showing a huge crater left after Monday’s attack, and rescue teams searching through the rubble.
“The Russians could not have been unaware that the local residents who remained in Komyshuvakha received humanitarian aid there every week,” the Ukrainian president wrote in a post on social media.
“This is yet another proof that Russia does not want any de-escalation.”
He said that after a recent a successful joint Russian-Ukrainian operation to evacuate civilians from the Russia-occupied southern city of Oleshky, “there was a moment when the next steps could show that peace is possible”.
“With such killings, Russia is sending the exact opposite signal – Russia is counting on further killings,” Zelensky said.
Meanwhile, Semikin said rescue teams were working at the scene, confirming “people were still under the rubble”.
The Russian military has not publicly commented.
Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
