A Russian drone strike on Monday struck the National Academy of Sciences in central Kyiv, killing one person and injuring three others, according to Kyiv Mayor Vitaliy Klitschko. Emergency services reported a fire engulfing part of the historic building, with footage showing people evacuating through windows as thick black smoke billowed from the structure.
The attack occurred as air raid sirens warned of incoming drones, and emergency responders worked to contain the blaze. Volodymyr Gorbulin, Ukraine’s former national security and defence council secretary, was at the academy at the time and sustained minor injuries, while his assistant was killed in the strike. The building is located near the German embassy, a cathedral, the national opera, and government offices.
Elsewhere in Ukraine, Russian strikes killed four people and wounded at least 19 in a business centre in Dnipro, while an unspecified number of fatalities were reported in a residential area of Kharkiv. Additional attacks damaged an ice cream factory in Zhytomyr, residential buildings in Sumy, Rivne, and Odesa, and wounded 30 civilians in Zaporizhzhia, three of them seriously.
Kyiv has faced intensified drone and missile attacks in recent weeks, with strikes occurring throughout the day rather than primarily at night. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky described the strikes as ‘terrorism’, stating that Russia has ‘no military objective’ in targeting civilian infrastructure. Poland scrambled jets to defend its airspace and warned citizens near the Ukrainian border to remain indoors.
The National Academy of Sciences condemned the attack as ‘Russian terror’, calling it an assault on ‘peaceful people at their workplaces’ and Ukrainian ‘science, education, and culture.’ Ukrainian authorities reported that the building houses critical research institutions, though the full extent of damage to scientific work remains unclear.