The midmorning strike hit as Ukrainians were celebrating Palm Sunday, officials said. It appeared to be the deadliest attack on civilians this year and came as the Trump administration pushes for a cease-fire.
Two Russian ballistic missiles slammed into a bustling city center in northeastern Ukraine on Sunday morning, officials said, killing at least 34 people in what appeared to be the deadliest attack against civilians this year.
The midmorning strike on the city of Sumy was the latest in a string of intensifying Russian attacks on urban centers in Ukraine that have inflicted heavy civilian casualties despite the Trump administration’s push for a cease-fire.
Officials said the city center was crowded with civilians out enjoying Palm Sunday, a Christian celebration popular in Ukraine, when the missiles hit. Lively streets were turned into scenes of carnage: Video of the aftermath showed mangled and bloodied bodies laying motionless, burning cars and debris covering the road as screams and sirens wailed in the background.
Two children were among the dead and at least 117 people were wounded, according to Ukraine’s emergency services.
“People were harmed right in the middle of the street — in cars, on public transport, in their homes,” the interior minister, Ihor Klymenko, lamented on social media.
Volodymyr Boiko, a 69-year-old Sumy resident, was riding in the back of a crowded bus when one of the missiles hit. He survived with cuts to his face, but said that those seated toward the front were not as lucky and took the full force of the blast. “It was just bodies, stacked on top of each other,” Mr. Boiko said.
