- Rescue operations continued for a second day at Okhmadit pediatric hospital in Kiev, where a Russian missile attack killed 42 people and wounded about 200.
- It was Russia’s first heavy bombing raid on Kiev in nearly four months and one of the deadliest of the war, hitting seven of the city’s 10 districts.
- Kiev city authorities declared Tuesday an official day of mourning. Entertainment events were banned and flags were lowered in the capital.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Tuesday rescue efforts were continuing for a second day at Kiev’s main children’s hospital after a Russian missile strike, as authorities raised the country’s death toll to 42, or about 200, from a heavy daytime barrage the previous day that hit several cities.
Zelenskyy said on the social platform X that 64 people were hospitalized in the capital, 28 in the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rog and six in Dnipro.
It was Russia’s largest bombing raid on Kiev in nearly four months and one of the deadliest of the war, hitting seven of the city’s 10 districts. The attack on Okhmadit Children’s Hospital halted open-heart surgeries and forced young cancer patients to undergo treatment outside, drawing international condemnation.
Russian missile hits children’s hospital in Kiev, Ukrainian President Zelensky vows retaliation
The 10-story hospital, Ukraine’s largest pediatric medical facility, was treating about 670 patients at the time of the attack, Okhmatdyt hospital director Volodymyr Zhovnir said on Tuesday. The missile struck a two-story wing of the hospital.
“The building where we provided dialysis for children with kidney failure and acute poisoning was completely destroyed,” he told reporters, estimating damage to the entire hospital at $2.5 million.
Daniel Bell, head of a UN team tracking human rights violations in Ukraine, said at least two people were killed at the hospital and about 50 were injured, including seven children.
Emergency services work at the scene at Okhmadit Children’s Hospital following a Russian missile attack in Kyiv, Ukraine, on July 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Evgeny Maloretka)
The death toll would have been much higher if patients had not been taken to bomb shelters when the air raid sirens first sounded, she added.
Authorities are working to restore power and water to the hospital, Zobnir said.
Kiev city authorities declared Tuesday an official day of mourning. Entertainment events were banned and flags were lowered in the capital.
Russia has denied responsibility for the hospital attack and insisted it is not attacking Ukrainian civilians, despite mounting evidence to the contrary, including a report by the Associated Press.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov echoed that view on Tuesday, pointing to a Russian Defense Ministry statement that blamed Ukrainian air defense missiles for the partial destruction of the hospital.
UN team leader Bell denied the allegations, saying video footage and findings from an investigation at the site showed the hospital “was a direct hit, not a result of an intercepted weapons system.”
Bell said the hospital was likely hit by a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile, a theory echoed by Ukrainian officials.
Three more bodies were found under rubble at a house in Kyiv’s Shevchenkovsky district on Tuesday, bringing the death toll at the single building to 10, authorities said.
Russia’s attack on Monday came on the eve of a NATO summit in Washington where allies are expected to pledge new military and economic aid to Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Moscow.
Since the Kremlin sent troops to Ukraine in February 2022, New Delhi’s importance as a major trading partner has grown.
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Zelensky strongly criticized Modi’s visit, saying in a statement late on Monday that it was “a great disappointment and a devastating blow to peace efforts to see the leader of the world’s largest democracy embracing the world’s most brutal criminals in Moscow on a day such as this.”
Meanwhile, Russian military and regional officials said on Tuesday that Ukrainian drones targeted six Russian regions overnight in what appeared to be a larger-than-usual air raid by Kiev’s forces.
The Russian Defense Ministry said air defense systems in five regions in southern and western Russia “destroyed or intercepted” a total of 38 Ukrainian drones.
