Kyiv: At least 32 people have been killed in a Russian missile strike on the Ukrainian city of Sumy on Sunday, officials said.
Two ballistic missiles struck the heart of the city at around 10:15 a.m. as people gathered to celebrate Palm Sunday, according to officials.
Images posted from the scene on official channels showed lines of black body bags lying on the side of the road, while more bodies were seen wrapped in foil blankets among the debris.
Video footage also showed fire crews as they fought to extinguish the shells of burnt-out cars among the rubble from damaged buildings.
“On this bright Palm Sunday, our community has suffered a terrible tragedy,” acting Mayor Artem Kobzar said in a statement on social media. “Unfortunately, we already know of more than 20 deaths.”
At least 32 people were killed as a result of the attack, including two children, the State Emergency Service of Ukraine said in a statement. A further 84 people were injured, including 10 children, it said.
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed that rescue efforts were ongoing and said “dozens” had been killed in the double missile attack.
“According to preliminary information, dozens of civilians were killed and wounded. Only filthy scum can act like this — taking the lives of ordinary people,” he said.
The attack on Sumy is the second large-scale attack to claim civilian lives in just over a week, following a deadly missile strike on Zelenskyy’s hometown of Kryvyi Rih on April 4 that killed some 20 people, including nine children.
Zelenskyy also called for a global response to the attack. “Talks have never stopped ballistic missiles and aerial bombs. What’s needed is an attitude toward Russia that a terrorist deserves,” he said.
Elsewhere in Ukraine, the mayor of the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, Ihor Terekhov, said Sunday that a Russian strike had hit one of the city’s kindergartens, shattering windows and damaging the building’s facade. No casualties were reported.
The strikes come a day after Russia and Ukraine’s senior diplomats accused each other of violating a tentative US-brokered deal to pause strikes on energy infrastructure, underscoring the challenges of negotiating an end to the 3-year war.
The two countries’ foreign ministers spoke at separate events at the annual Antalya Diplomacy Forum, a day after US envoy Steve Witkoff met with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss peace prospects.
“The Ukrainians have been attacking us from the very beginning, every passing day, maybe with two or three exceptions,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said, adding that Moscow would provide the US, Turkiye and international bodies with a list of Kyiv’s attacks during the past three weeks.
His Ukrainian counterpart, Andrii Sybiha, contested that claim, saying Saturday that Russia had launched “almost 70 missiles, over 2,200 (exploding) drones, and over 6,000 guided aerial bombs at Ukraine, mostly at civilians” since agreeing to the limited pause on strikes.
