A Russian drone strike killed a 1-year-old girl in a stroller at a crowded Ukrainian park Monday — as the United Nations reported that civilian deaths and injuries surged 85% in September from a year earlier.
The toddler was among at least five people killed when a Russian drone slammed into the central park of Nova Vodolaha in Ukraine’s northeastern Kharkiv region, where families with children had gathered, according to Ukrainian authorities.
“Unfortunately, two women and an infant who was in a stroller were killed,” Ukrainian official Ivan Vyhivskyi wrote on Telegram.
At least 15 others were wounded, including seven children, according to Kharkiv Regional Gov. Oleh Syniehubov, who said emergency medical teams were transporting victims to hospitals.
The governor reported six fatalities, including three children, before issuing an updated breakdown identifying five dead — three women ages 28, 34 and 36, and two girls ages 11 and 14 months.
A nearby cafe was also damaged in the attack, officials said.
The bloodshed came as UN human rights monitors warned that Russia’s intensifying bombardment of Ukraine has pushed civilian casualties to some of the highest levels since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
At least 328 civilians were killed and another 2,105 injured in September — an 85% increase in casualties over the same month last year.
The carnage has extended well beyond the front lines, with casualties reported across 22 Ukrainian regions and the capital Kyiv.
In Kyiv alone, civilians were killed or injured on 22 of September’s 30 days — the highest frequency recorded in any month since Russia’s 2022 invasion, according to the UN.
The latest figures bring the verified civilian toll for the first nine months of 2026 to 2,570 dead and 15,211 wounded — a 59% increase in total casualties over the same period last year.
And the killing has continued into October.
“The first two weeks of October were among the deadliest periods for civilians in years,” said Danielle Bell, head of the UN’s human rights monitoring mission in Ukraine.
A Russian cruise missile and drone barrage on the night of Oct. 6 and 7 killed 22 civilians and injured 45 others in Pryluky, in the northern Chernihiv region, according to UN monitors.
Meanwhile, Moscow has stepped up attacks on Ukraine’s electricity and heating infrastructure as winter approaches.
Russian strikes on Oct. 13 and 14 damaged multiple energy facilities, including Kyiv’s three main power stations, temporarily leaving some 600,000 residents of the capital without electricity, according to Ukrainian authorities.
The International Organization for Migration warned that further damage to energy infrastructure could force Ukrainians who have already returned to their homes to flee again.
Some 1.45 million returnees are living in frontline districts, while roughly 2.1 million elderly Ukrainians live alone in apartment buildings, leaving them particularly vulnerable to prolonged power and heating outages.
“Systematically attacking electricity and heating infrastructure as winter approaches is bound to inflict significant suffering on the civilian population,” Bell warned.
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