RUSSIAN strikes killed at least 265 civilians in Ukraine and injured 1,816 in June, the highest combined casualty count since the first months after Moscow’s full-scale invasion in February 2022, a top UN official told the Security Council yesterday.
UN political affairs chief Rosemary DiCarlo said the number of civilians killed and injured in Ukraine in May had been the highest since April 2022, but data from the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) pointed to an even higher toll in June, and possibly July.
Final data for June will be released in late July, a UN spokesperson said.
“This concerning trend is seemingly continuing into July,” DiCarlo said, citing three massive waves of Russian aerial strikes on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities this past week alone, many targeting urban centres with large civilian populations.
“Any attacks against civilians and civilian infrastructure, wherever they occur, are a clear violation of international humanitarian law and must stop immediately,” she said.
In total, DiCarlo said OHCHR had verified that at least 16,402 civilians, including 802 children, had been killed in Ukraine since the start of the war, and 48,428 had been injured, including 2,948 children. The actual figures were likely higher.
Civilians living in Ukrainian territories under Russian occupation and inside Russia were also being killed, she said.
Russian authorities have reported that 250 civilians were killed and 1,596 were injured inside Russia in the first six months of 2026, but the UN was not in a position to verify the reports, DiCarlo said.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said yesterday that Russia struck an ammunition warehouse during its attack on the Kyiv region earlier this week, adding that a criminal probe was launched.
In the small town of Vyshneve on Kyiv’s western outskirts, the Russian strike hit the warehouse and set off massive secondary explosions on July 6. Ukrainian officials said 10 people were killed in Vyshneve and hundreds of houses were damaged.
“As for the investigation into the explosion in Vyshneve, the situation is absolutely appalling: There was an ammunition depot in Vyshneve. The enemy struck this depot, causing a large number of casualties and significant losses,” Zelenskiy told reporters in a WhatsApp media chat.
Ukrainian officials rarely disclose any damage to military targets following Russian attacks.
Zelenskiy said a criminal case had been opened, and officials at the state weapons producer Ukroboronprom, which owned the warehouse, would be held responsible and some of them dismissed.
The episode sparked public outcry, with residents claiming negligence and lack of information.
&uuid=(email))