CNN
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Ukraine’s largest children’s hospital was likely hit directly by a Russian missile on Monday, according to a United Nations assessment after NATO agreed to strengthen Kyiv’s air defenses following the attack.
Russia has repeatedly denied attacking the Kyiv hospital and claimed the explosion was caused by a Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile, though without providing evidence. However, a UN human rights official said evidence suggested Moscow’s forces were responsible for the deadly attack.
“Analysis of the video footage and on-site assessment indicate with a high degree of probability that the children’s hospital suffered a direct hit and was not damaged by an intercepted weapons system,” Danielle Bell, head of the UN human rights monitoring mission in Ukraine, told reporters on Tuesday.
Bell said the attack damaged the intensive care, surgical and oncology wards of Kyiv’s Okhmatdyt hospital, which are critical for treating some of the country’s most seriously ill children. He added that Ukrainian officials have since transferred 600 children to other hospitals.
“This horrific attack shows that nowhere in Ukraine is safe,” Bell added.
The UN’s assessment is consistent with that of weapons experts who told CNN that it is very likely that a Russian Kh-101 cruise missile hit the children’s hospital in Kyiv on Monday.
After reviewing video footage verified and geolocated by CNN, as well as images of fragments from the scene, weapons experts said the evidence strongly suggests the hospital was hit by a Russian cruise missile, not a Ukrainian anti-aircraft missile.
Justin Bronk, a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute in London, told CNN on Wednesday that the flight profile of the missile that hit the hospital was “just right for the Kh-101, with the right dive angle, under full power and no tumbling or falling like you might see with a launched anti-aircraft missile.” The silhouette of the missile seen in the footage also matches the Kh-101, Bronk said.
Ukrainian authorities said two adults were killed and 16 others – including seven children – were injured in the attack when Russia launched a brazen airstrike on targets in cities across Ukraine during the morning rush hour, killing at least 43 people in total.
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Close-up of the damage at Okhmatdyt Hospital in Kyiv, Ukraine, on July 9.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned the attacks in Ukraine “in the strongest possible terms,” while UN Human Rights Commissioner Volker Turk called for a “prompt, thorough and independent investigation” into the attacks.
The Russian attacks came during a meeting of NATO leaders in Washington, where the United States and NATO allies agreed to supply Ukraine with more Patriot batteries and additional systems to bolster Kyiv’s air defenses, members of the defense alliance said in a joint statement on Tuesday.
In his opening speech at the NATO summit, US President Joe Biden also announced plans to deliver new air defence systems to Ukraine – thereby offering the country urgently needed support at a critical stage in its defence against the Russian invasion.
In his speech on Tuesday, Biden vowed: “The United States will ensure that Ukraine is at the forefront of our export of critical air defense interceptor missiles.”
Images and videos from the aftermath of the attack on the Kyiv hospital show children with cancer being treated outside the facility and an injured toddler with blood on his face and arms.
A CNN crew on the scene on Tuesday said the extent of the destruction showed how violent the explosion must have been. A pile of rubble was visible where part of the factory had once stood, and under part of the floor lay the remains of a car that had been completely flattened when the building collapsed.
The UN monitoring mission said it was likely that a KH-101 cruise missile fired by Russia hit the children’s hospital. The decision was based “on video footage showing the technical specifications of the type of weapon used” and that this footage “shows that the weapon struck the hospital directly and was not intercepted in the air,” Bell said.
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People clear debris from a building of Ukraine’s largest children’s hospital, which was partially destroyed by a Russian missile strike, in Kyiv, Ukraine, July 8, 2024.
A military expert who visited the site after the explosion said the damage was “consistent with a direct hit,” according to Bell.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in Washington on Tuesday: “Russia always knows where its missiles will hit. Always.”
On Tuesday, Russian UN Ambassador Vasily Nebenzia reiterated Moscow’s statement that there had been an attack on the children’s hospital.
“We did not bomb the children’s hospital,” Nebenzia said at a special session of the UN Security Council convened after the attack. “If it had been a Russian attack, nothing would have been left of the building at all. All the children and most of the adults would have been killed, not injured.”
But the US also blamed Russia for the attack on the hospital. US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield said at the UN Security Council meeting that the Russian “attack makes it abundantly clear: Putin is not interested in peace.”
Kiev described the attack as a “targeted attack by Russia.” The Ukrainian State Security Service (SBU) said the facility was hit by a Russian long-range cruise missile.
“Relevant evidence has already been found at the scene of the tragedy: in particular, fragments of the rear part of a Kh-101 rocket with a serial number and part of the steering wheel of the same rocket,” the SBU said.
SBU chief Vasyl Malyuk assured that the agency would respond to what he considered to be Russian war crimes.
“This retaliation will be both legal and moral,” he said.
