This is the conclusion reached by experts who have analyzed video footage and examined the damage directly on site, said Danielle Bell, head of the UN human rights observer mission in Ukraine. She calls this “one of the most egregious attacks we have seen since the invasion began.”
According to the Russian version, the hospital was hit by Ukrainian air defenses. The spokesman for the presidential office in Moscow, Dmitry Peskov, did not provide any evidence for this claim. “I insist that we do not attack civilian targets,” Peskov confirmed. The missiles in question were NASAMS missiles, explained the spokeswoman for the Foreign Ministry in Moscow, Maria Zakharova. NASAMS is a modern surface-to-air missile defense system that the USA developed together with Norway.
The Ukrainian domestic intelligence service SBU says it has new evidence that the children’s hospital was hit directly by a Russian Kh-101 Kalibr missile. “The experts’ conclusions are clear – it was a direct attack,” the SBU explains on the Telegram short message service. It shows pictures of a fragment of a rocket engine that was said to have been found at the site of the impact. The analysis of the trajectory and the type of damage caused proves that it was a direct hit.
Other cities in Ukraine were also attacked with rockets. According to Ukrainian sources, at least 41 civilians were killed in the heaviest air strike in months.
Day of mourning set
A day of mourning has been scheduled for Tuesday in Kiev. A missing boy was found dead in the rubble of a damaged apartment building in Kiev during the night. According to the latest figures, 27 people, including 4 children, were killed by the impact of several rockets and cruise missiles in the city of three million, according to Kiev’s civil protection agency following the devastating Russian air strike on Monday. 117 people were injured. There were further victims in the Dnipropetrovsk region in the south.
Seven people were killed in a large residential building near the clinic, including three children. Two people died in an unspecified industrial plant. Unofficial reports suggest attacks on a defense company. Nine people were killed in another partially destroyed hospital and seven people were killed in a business center.
The United Nations Security Council in New York will discuss the devastating attack this followingnoon. Since Russia has veto power in the Security Council, unanimous condemnation of the actions of the Russian armed forces is not to be expected. “We must hold Russia accountable for the terror and (Kremlin chief Vladimir) Putin for the orders to carry out the attacks,” demanded Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during a visit to Warsaw. “Whenever someone tries to talk to them regarding peace, Russia responds with attacks on homes and hospitals.”
“Cruel reminder of Russia’s brutality”
US President Joe Biden called the attacks “a gruesome reminder of Russia’s brutality.” It is crucial that the world continues to stand by Ukraine at this important moment, he warned. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Türk, condemned the rocket attacks and called for those responsible to be held accountable. “Among the victims were Ukraine’s sickest children,” the Austrian said in Geneva.
The attack on the children’s hospital also caused horror in Austria. Federal Chancellor Kar Nehammer (ÖVP) condemned the Russian attack on Monday as “cruel and in the strongest possible terms.” Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen stressed: “This horror that is being inflicted on the people of Ukraine must stop.” Health Minister Johannes Rauch (Greens) offered Ukraine support for the survivors on X. Vice Chancellor Werner Kogler (Greens) spoke of a “disgusting blow from the aggressor Putin.” The Foreign Ministry also described the act as “more than disgusting!” The Okhmatdyt hospital had benefited from Austrian aid. “We will continue our support and #StandWithUkraine,” the ministry stressed on X.
1,900 attacks on health care facilities
The World Health Organization has counted nearly 1,900 attacks on hospitals, doctor’s offices, ambulances and similar targets since the start of Russia’s war of aggression in February 2022. Under universal international humanitarian law, such health care facilities may not be attacked, as the International Committee of the Red Cross has stated many times on X. “Our teams are increasingly observing attacks on civilian and medical infrastructure by Russian forces across Ukraine, in towns and villages on the front lines and in the interior of the country,” said Christopher Stokes, MSF’s emergency coordinator in Ukraine.
Meanwhile, according to Russian sources, Ukraine attacked several regions on the border and further inland with drones. Two substations and an oil depot in Volgograd in southern Russia caught fire due to falling debris from drones, the regional governor there, Andrei Bocharov, said on Telegram. In the Rostov region, according to local authorities, a fire broke out in a substation, but it was extinguished. In the border region of Belgorod, one person died in a nighttime attack and two were injured, according to Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov. Russian air defense systems destroyed 38 drones, including 21 over the Rostov region and seven over Kursk, the Defense Ministry in Moscow said. Both regions border Ukraine.
