At least four students killed in drone strike on dormitory in occupied Ukraine

At least four students have been killed and 35 injured in a drone strike which hit a college dormitory in Starobilsk, in Ukraine’s occupied Luhansk region, the local Russian-backed administration said on Friday.

According to the Moscow-installed head of the occupied Luhansk region, Leonid Pasechnik, Ukrainian drones struck buildings belonging to the Luhansk Pedagogical University overnight, as well as several administrative buildings, shops, and residential blocks in Starobilsk.

“The Ukrainian Armed Forces deliberately targeted defenceless children as they slept”, Pasechnik said. “Enemy drones attacked the teaching block and dormitory at Starobilsk College, part of our teacher training university.”

Eighty-six students between the ages of 14–18 were sleeping in the building at the time of the drone strike, some of whom may still be trapped under rubble, he added. Rescue operations at the site were reportedly interrupted due to the threat of a repeat attack.

Russia’s Emergency Situations Ministry initially announced that the body of one victim had been recovered. Subsequent reports, citing Russian Children’s Rights Commissioner Yana Lantratova, indicated that at least four people had died.

Breaking news outlet Mash found several posts published on local forums on Friday morning seeking information about missing teenage girls believed to have been in the dormitory at the time of the attack.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky did not directly acknowledge the attack in his daily Telegram update on Friday morning, but said that the Armed Forces of Ukraine had carried out “targeted strikes in the temporarily occupied territory of Ukraine.”

In her social media post, Lantratova added that she was preparing an official complaint to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, the UN Human Rights Council, and the Secretary General of the OSCE.

Russia’s Investigative Committee also announced that it was opening a criminal investigation into the strike, which it characterised as a “terrorist attack”. As part of the investigation, the committee said it would examine “the actions of the Ukrainian military personnel who directed the drones towards a civilian facility”.