Russians kill 20 civilians, including nine children in Kryvyi Rih, the Dnipropetrovsk Oblast (updated)

Russian forces launched a missile attack on the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih, killing at least 20 people and wounding 50 others, according to regional head Serhii Lysak, BBC News reports.

Six of the dead were children, said President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, who grew up in Kryvyi Rih.

Images from the scene showed at least one victim lying in a playground cordoned off by police.

The Russian Ministry of Defense stated it hit the “location of a meeting of commanders of formations of the Armed Forces of Ukraine with Western instructors.”

The head of the city’s defence administration, Oleksandr Vilkul, said a ballistic missile struck the centre of a residential area.

One video showed a large section of a 10-storey block of flats destroyed by the attack and victims lying on the road outside.

The General Staff of Ukraine disclosed that on April 4, Russians launched a strike on Kryvyi Rih with an Iskander-M ballistic missile with a cluster warhead, designed to hit a larger area and a greater number of people.

This Russian attack, early on Friday evening, ranks among the deadliest on Kryvyi Rih since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in 2022 and comes as US President Donald Trump advocates for a ceasefire.

Later, on April 6, Vilkul and Lysak informed that the number of people killed increased to 20 after a 57-year-old man died in hospital.

“Unfortunately, the death toll from Russia’s terrorist attack on 4 April has risen to 20. A 57-year-old man has died in hospital from multiple injuries. Doctors worked around the clock doing everything possible and impossible, but the injuries were fatal,” Vilkul wrote.

On Friday, Zelenskyy posted on social media that the strike damaged at least five buildings.

“There is only one reason why this continues: Russia doesn’t want a ceasefire, and we see it,” the President wrote. 

Ukrainian President reiterated that the end of the war depends on global pressure on Russia and the strengthening of Ukraine’s military capabilities.

He believes that the United States, Europe and other countries around the world have sufficient means to force Russia to abandon terror and war. “And this must be ensured – peace is needed,” Zelenskyy stressed.

The regional leader in Kryvyi Rih said medical personnel treated more than 50 people for wounds, and the youngest was only three months old.

Military chiefs from the UK and France met with Zelensky in Kyiv on Friday to discuss plans for foreign peacekeepers to deploy in Ukraine as part of a potential ceasefire deal.

But there has been little sign of a let-up in the violence.

Russian forces also attacked Kryvyi Rih earlier this week when a missile hit a building in the centre, leaving four people dead.

On April 4, Russian drone strikes on the north-eastern city of Kharkiv killed another five people.

France and the UK have accused Russia of dragging its feet on the Ukraine peace deal. UK Foreign Minister David Lammy told reporters at a Nato summit in Brussels that the Russian leader “could accept a ceasefire now, [but] he continues to bombard Ukraine, its civilian population”.