Kyiv finds more bodies as toll in Russian attack rises

Emergency workers pulled more bodies Wednesday from the rubble of a nine-story Kyiv apartment building demolished by a Russian missile, raising the death toll from the latest attack on the Ukrainian capital to 28.

The building in Kyiv’s Solomianskyi district took a direct hit and collapsed during the deadliest Russian attack on Kyiv this year. Authorities said that 23 of those killed were inside the building. The remaining five died elsewhere in the city.

Workers used cranes, excavators and their hands to clear more debris from the site, while sniffer dogs searched for buried victims. The blast blew out windows and doors in neighboring buildings in a wide radius of damage.

The attack overnight on Monday into Tuesday was part of a sweeping barrage as Russia once again sought to overwhelm Ukrainian air defenses. Russia fired more than 440 drones and 32 missiles in what Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said was one of the biggest bombardments of the war, now in its fourth year.

Russia has launched a summer offensive on parts of the roughly 1,000-kilometre front line and has intensified long-range attacks that have struck urban residential areas.

At the same time, US-led peace efforts have failed to grain traction.

Also, Middle East tensions and US trade tariffs have drawn world attention away from Ukraine’s pleas for more diplomatic and economic pressure to be placed on Russia.

The US Embassy in Kyiv said the attack clashed with the attempts by the administration of President Donald Trump to reach a settlement that will stop the fighting.

“This senseless attack runs counter to President Trump’s call to stop the killing and end the war,” the embassy posted on social platform X. Kyiv authorities declared on Wednesday an official day of mourning.

Mourners laid flowers on swings and slides at a playground across the street from the collapsed building. On Tuesday, a man had waited hours there for his 31-year-old son’s body to be pulled from the rubble.

Drones were striking every few minutes within hundreds of meters of the building hit by the missile.

The continuing attack forced firefighters and rescue teams to delay the rescue operation.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is scheduled to participate in person at the June 24-25 Nato summit in The Hague, a source in the Ukrainian presidency told AFP on Wednesday. Nato members are expected to agree a major increase in defence spending under pressure from US President Donald Trump at the gathering.

“The decision will be made on the eve of the summit. This is just the schedule,” the Ukrainian source said, describing the meeting as “an opportunity to maintain support and promote a ceasefire”.

Diplomats and officials at Nato say Zelensky is invited to a formal dinner for leaders hosted by the Dutch king on the evening of June 24, which Trump is expected to attend.

Zelensky will also likely attend a forum on the defence industry being held on the sidelines of the summit.

But there will be no formal working session between the Ukrainian president and Nato’s 32 leaders as there was at the previous Nato summit in Washington.

Zelensky wants Nato to offer security guarantees to Ukraine in the event of a ceasefire or peace deal with Russia - something Moscow has called “unacceptable.”

Separately, Russian forces hit a Ukrainian troop position in the northeast Sumy region with an Iskander missile, state news agency TASS cited the Russian defence ministry as saying on Wednesday.

The Russian defence ministry did not provide the date of the strike, but said the area around city of Konotop was targeted.

Ukrainian authorities in the region reported an Iskander missile strike on Konotop on Monday. The local administration said on Facebook that it had damaged flats in several multi-storey buildings and that there were no casualties.

Ukraine in recent days has been trying to drive Russian forces from Sumy region, where border areas are gripped by heavy fighting.

Zelensky said on the weekend that Russia has amassed 53,000 troops in the region.

Agencies