A Russian missile attack on the central Ukrainian city of Kryvyi Rih has killed at least 18 people and left dozens wounded, Ukrainian officials have said.
Nine of the dead were children, said President Volodymyr Zelensky, who grew up in Kryvyi Rih. Local officials said a ballistic missile had hit a residential area.
Images showed at least one victim lying in a playground, while a video showed a large section of a 10-storey block of flats destroyed and victims lying on the road.
Russia’s defence ministry later claimed a “high-precision missile strike” had targeted a meeting of “unit commanders and Western instructors” in a restaurant, and that up to 85 were killed. It provided no evidence.
Ukraine’s military responded by saying that Russia was spreading false information to try to “cover up its cynical crime”. It said Moscow had fired an Iskander-M ballistic missile with a cluster warhead to maximise casualties.
The attack, early on Friday evening, was among the deadliest on Kryvyi Rih since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022, and comes as US President Donald Trump pushes for a ceasefire.
Zelensky wrote on social media that at least five buildings had been damaged in Friday’s strike: “There is only one reason why this continues: Russia doesn’t want a ceasefire, and we see it.”
The head of Kryvyi Rih’s defence, Oleksandr Vilkul, said a residential area was hit.
“The missile exploded in the air… to injure more people,” he said. “Children were killed on or near a playground.”
Serhii Lysak, the head of the Dnipropetrovsk region where Kryvyi Rih is located, said more than 40 people were treated for wounds, and the youngest was only three months old.
Later on Friday, Vilkul reported more explosions, saying the city was under a “mass” drone attack that triggered fires in at least four locations.
He said one elderly woman burned to death in a private house hit by a drone. Another five people were injured elsewhere.
Military chiefs from both the UK and France met Zelensky in Kyiv earlier in the day to discuss plans for foreign peacekeepers to be stationed in Ukraine as part of a potential ceasefire deal.
But there has been little sign of a let-up in the violence.
Kryvyi Rih also came under attack earlier this week when a building in the centre was struck, leaving four people dead.
On Thursday, Russian drone strikes on the north-eastern city of Kharkiv claimed another five lives, local officials said.
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”.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the Russians knew the American position, “and we will know from their answers very soon whether they are serious about proceeding with real peace or whether it is a delay tactic”.
Kryvyi Rih is about 40 miles (70km) from the front line in eastern Ukraine and with a population of 600,000 it is reputed to be the longest city in Europe.