At a funeral in Ukraine, a Russian airstrike kills 51 people

 At a funeral in Ukraine, a Russian airstrike kills 51 people

According to Ukraine, a Russian airstrike on the town of Hroza, southeast of Kharkiv, resulted in the deaths of at least 51 people, including an eight-year-old boy.

At 15:15 local time (13:15 BST), a missile struck when residents of the village were attending a wake for a deceased local.

According to the defense ministry of Ukraine, only civilians were present in the area.

Oleh Synyehubov, the regional governor of Kharkiv, called the assault one of the "bloodiest crimes" in the area.

He affirmed that everyone who perished was a villager, and that today's attack left 20% of the village's population dead.

He declared on public television that "one terrorist attack has claimed the lives of one-fifth of this village."

Every household in the area, according to Ukrainian Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko, was affected: "There were people present from every family, from every household."

According to Interfax Ukraine, a Ukrainian soldier's funeral was taking place. According to local prosecutor Dmytro Chubenko, his wife, son, who was also a soldier, and daughter-in-law were among those killed.

The soldier had been interred in Dnipro before, but his family decided to reinter him in his hometown.

One of the worst assaults of the Ukraine War, according to a Ukrainecast

The deed "couldn't even be called a beastly act - because it would be an insult to beasts," according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

He asserted that it "was not a blind strike" and that Russia intentionally targeted the area as people gathered for the funeral service.

"Who is capable of firing a missile at them? Who? Only pure evil," he declared.

Since Vladimir Putin began his full-scale invasion in February of last year, the Kupyansk district, of which the settlement is a part, has been the scene of fierce fighting between the Russian and Ukrainian soldiers.

At the beginning of the war, it served as a significant supply depot for Russian forces, but after months of battle, Kyiv took it back in September 2022.

The BBC was unable to independently confirm the interior minister's assertion that an Iskander missile was used in the attack.

While Mr. Zelensky was in Granada, Spain for the summit of European leaders, Russia bombed the settlement.

Josep Borrell, the top diplomat for the European Union, there issued a warning that political squabbling was endangering the US's capacity to support the Ukrainian military.

The US Congress just reached a budget agreement without including cash for Ukraine.

No European nation, according to Mr. Borrell, would be able to fill the void left by any decline in American assistance.

"Can Europe fill the void the US left behind? Europe cannot, of course, take the place of the US, he remarked.

On Thursday, Mr. Zelensky requested more air defense missiles from European leaders and suggested that other nations should reward Ukraine for defending them against Russian aggression.