Casualties and Destruction from Wave of Russian Missile Attacks in Ukraine

“Today before dawn countless people across Ukraine experienced another wave of attacks that brought more death, life-changing injuries, trauma, loss of property, and destruction,” said the head of the HRMMU, Danielle Bell.

Local authorities reported that seven people were killed and 86 injured as a result of the attacks in the cities of Kharkiv, Kyiv, Pavlohrad and other locations. The largest casualty number was reported from the eastern city of Kharkiv with six persons killed and 57 injured, including eight children.

In Kharkiv, HRMMU staff visited the site of an almost completely destroyed 5-storey residential building that appeared to have been directly hit by several missiles at around 7 am on 23 January. The building is located in a residential area in the central part of the city and the attack had shattered windows and doors of buildings in a large radius around the impact site.

In Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, HRMMU staff visited a residential area that was damaged during the attack, including a residential building, a school, a sports centre and a kindergarten. The damage appeared to have been caused by falling debris from intercepted missiles. 

HRMMU spoke with several residents who were visibly shaken even hours after the attack.

A middle-aged woman who lives in one of the residential buildings most severely affected by today's strike in the Solomyanskyi district in Kyiv told HRMMU that she was seeking shelter in the corridor in her apartment when the attack struck. The attack broke windows and damaged furniture in her apartment but left her uninjured. “We were not wounded, we survived, but many in Ukraine were not so lucky this morning,” she told HRMMU.

Today’s missile barrage appeared to be the largest since a wave of Russian drone and missile attacks launched in late December and early January, in which hundreds of civilians were killed and wounded in the course of just 10 days. That spate of attacks represented an alarming reversal of an earlier trend that saw a steady decrease in civilian deaths and injuries throughout 2023. 

More than 10,000 civilians have been killed and nearly 20,000 have been injured since Russia launched an all-out attack on Ukraine 23 months ago HRMMU says.

This is HRMMU's  latest report on casualty figures.