- By Christy Cooney
- BBC News
1 hour ago
People from “every family” in the Ukrainian village of Hroza were affected by a rocket attack that killed 51 people, Ukraine’s interior minister said.
At least 51 people were killed when the strike affected a resident of the village southeast of Kharkiv.
“People from every household were present,” said Ihor Klymenko.
Ukraine’s Defense Ministry blamed Russia for the attack and said there were no military targets in the area.
Russia has not directly commented on the attack.
But on Friday, Russian state news agency Ria Novosti reported that the Russian military had carried out 20 air and artillery strikes on Ukrainian targets in the Kupiansk district – where the village of Hroza is located. It was not specified when the attacks were carried out, nor was the village of Hroza mentioned.
As Interfax Ukraine reported, members of the village had been attending the funeral of a Ukrainian soldier when the rocket hit on Thursday.
It quoted local prosecutor Dmytro Chubenko as saying that the man’s widow, her son – also a soldier – and her daughter-in-law were among the dead.
The soldier had previously been buried in Dnipro, but his relatives said they wanted to rebury him in his home village.
People who had attended the service were eating when the rocket hit a cafe and grocery store in the village, officials said.
Local police said an eight-year-old boy was among the victims.
Speaking to Radio 4’s World Tonight program, Maria Avdeeva, a Ukrainian security analyst and journalist, said someone may have told the Russian military about the wake.
“We can assume that someone is leaking information about the place and time of these people’s gathering,” she said.
“According to what we are now seeing on Russian propaganda channels, they are spreading information that there were military gatherings at the funeral, which is false and untrue since it was mainly a civilian ceremony.”
Kharkiv regional head Oleh Synyehubov called the attack one of the “bloodiest crimes” in the region.
“A fifth of this village died in a single terrorist attack,” he said.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said the act “cannot even be called a bestial act – because it would be an insult to the beasts.”
The attack has also led to international condemnation.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said the attack “demonstrated the depths of depravity that Russian forces are willing to sink.” His comments came after he met Mr. Zelensky earlier on Thursday at a summit in Spain of the European Political Community, an intergovernmental forum created last year in part in response to the invasion of Ukraine.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre called the attack “horrific” and said it showed why it was so important that the Ukrainian people continue to receive international support.
The incident comes as opposition to further funding for Ukraine faces growing opposition in the US House of Representatives.
The Kupiansk district, which includes the village, has been at the forefront of clashes between Russian and Ukrainian armies since Russian President Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February last year.
It was a key supply hub for Russian forces at the start of the war, but Kiev recaptured it in September 2022 after months of fighting.