At least 51 killed in rocket attack in Ukraine's Kharkiv region

A Russian rocket struck a village caf and store in Eastern Ukraine on Thursday and killed at least 51 civilians in one of the deadliest attacks in months, according to President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and other top officials in Kyiv.

Zelenskyy denounced the attackin the village of Hroza as a "demonstrably brutal Russian crime" and "a completely deliberate act of terrorism."

Presidential chief of staff Andrii Yermak and Kharkiv Gov. Oleh Syniehubov said a six-year-old boy was among the dead, adding that six other people were wounded.

About 60 people were in the caf attending a wake after a funeral, said Internal Affairs Minister Ihor Klymenko, speaking on national TV.

According to preliminary information from Kyiv, the village was struck by an Iskander missile. Emergency crews were searching the rubble of damaged buildings. Ukrainian prosecutors released pictures showing bloodied bodies and emergency workers combing through the building's smoldering debris.

Hroza and other parts of the eastern Kharkiv region were seized by Russia early in the war and recaptured by Ukraine in September 2022. The village is located 30 kilometres west of Kupiansk. Zelenskyy had visited the area Tuesday to meet with troops and inspect equipment supplied by the West.

Looking to shore up winter defences

Zelenskyy was in Granada, in southern Spain, with about 50 European leaders, where he asked for more Western support, saying that "Russian terror must be stopped."

"The key for us, especially before winter, is to strengthen air defence, and there is already a basis for new agreements with partners," he said in a statement posted on his Telegram channel.

Last winter, Russia targeted Ukraine's energy system and other vital infrastructure in a steady barrage of missile and drone attacks, triggering continuous power outages across the country. Ukraine's power system has shown a high degree of resilience and flexibility, helping alleviate the damage, but there have been concerns that Russia will again ramp up its strikes on power facilities as winter draws nearer.

Zelenskyy noted the Granada summit will also focus on "joint work for global food security and protection of freedom of navigation" in the Black Sea, where the Russian military has targeted Ukrainian ports after Moscow's withdrawal from a UN-sponsored grain deal designed to ensure safe exports from the invaded country's ports.

Asked if he was worried that support for Ukraine could falter in the U.S. Congress, where Republican instability has consumed the House of Representatives, the Ukrainian president stressed that his visit to Washington last month made him confident of strong backing by both the Biden administration and Congress.

Earlier Thursday, Russia targeted Ukraine's southern regions with drones. Ukraine's air force said that the country's air defences intercepted 24 out of 29 Iranian-made drones that Russia launched at the Odesa, Mykolaiv and Kirovohrad regions.

Andriy Raykovych, head of the Kirovohrad regional administration, said an infrastructure facility in the region was struck and emergency services were deployed to extinguish a fire, but there were no casualties.

In other Russian attacks on Ukraine in the past day, two civilians were killed in shelling of the southern city of Kherson and another one died after a Russian strike on the city of Krasnohorivka in the eastern Donetsk region. At least eight people were wounded by Russian shelling, according to Ukraine's presidential office.

A Russian strike on a hospital in the city of Beryslav, in the Kherson region, ravaged the building and wounded two medical workers, according to the regional administration chief.

Ukraine, in turn, has struck back at Russia with regular drone attacks across the border.