Dozens killed in Russian strikes on Ukraine aid sites

Kyiv — Russian strikes on an aid centre, a hospice and a hospital killed dozens of people across Ukraine over 24 hours, Ukrainian officials said on Tuesday, hours after the war's longest ceasefire expired. The BBC put the total civilian toll at at least 38, with scores more injured.

The deadliest blow fell on Komyshuvakha, a village in the southern Zaporizhzhia region, where nine 3,000kg aerial bombs hit a school being used to distribute humanitarian aid on Monday night. The Hindu reported the toll there at 31, with more than 45 people missing; the BBC said at least 33 had died, with over 50 feared trapped. The dead included four police officers and two rescue workers. Three days of mourning were declared in the region.

President Volodymyr Zelensky called the strike "one of the largest mass killings committed by Russia during this war", and said it was Moscow's answer to a Ukrainian proposal to extend last week's truce in neighbouring Kherson. Russia's defence ministry said it had targeted Ukrainian military units and killed 25 servicemen. BBC News Russian's defence correspondent reported no credible evidence of a military presence at the site, and the UN's human rights monitoring mission said the attack "seems to have violated the most fundamental principles of international humanitarian law".

Elsewhere, a missile destroyed a hospice in Dnipro, forcing the transfer of nearly 50 terminally ill patients, the oldest aged 90. In Kharkiv, a hospital was hit in an attack Zelensky said wounded 73 people, most of them elderly patients. Five more people were killed in the eastern Donetsk region. Overnight strikes on energy infrastructure in nine regions cut Kyiv's water supply entirely, suspended the metro, and halted three DTEK power plants, according to the utility.

The barrage landed hours after a US-brokered ceasefire around the Russian-occupied town of Oleshky — the longest truce of the war — expired on Sunday without reported breaches. France 24 reported that Kyiv had offered to extend it; Moscow refused, and the Kremlin did not deny Ukrainian claims it used the pause to fortify positions, with spokesman Dmitry Peskov calling that "a completely normal practice".

The next test comes quickly. The Kremlin has confirmed it will join US-brokered three-way talks with Ukraine in Abu Dhabi on 10-11 November, the first trilateral meeting since February. Zelensky, speaking in Berlin, said he had seen no indication Russia intends to negotiate seriously. Whether Moscow sends a delegation empowered to do more than talk is the decision to watch.