Zelensky: A huge disappointment, a devastating blow! Hug the world's most bloody... PHOTO

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday criticized his Indian counterpart’s visit to Moscow as a “huge disappointment and a devastating blow to peace efforts,” on the same day that a Russian missile smashed into a children’s hospital in Kyiv.

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Russian President Vladimir Putin at his residence in Novo-Ogaryovo outside Moscow on Monday, while 900 kilometers away, Russian missiles rained down on Ukrainian cities in a morning rush hour assault that killed at least 37 people and injured 170 others.

Modi’s two-day trip marks his first visit to Russia since Putin began his full-scale invasion of Ukraine nearly two and a half years ago, with images and video Monday showing the two leaders hugging, chatting over tea, riding in an electric vehicle and watching a horse show.

“It is a huge disappointment and a devastating blow to peace efforts to see the leader of the world’s largest democracy hug the world’s most bloody criminal in Moscow on such a day,” Zelensky said in a post on X on Monday, referring to the deadly Russian attacks, as CNN reports.

Tanjug/AP Photo/Anton Shtuka

The large-scale daylight bombardment struck the capital Kyiv, and cities including Dnipro, Kryvyi Rih, Slovyansk and Kramatorsk – some of which are heavily populated areas far from the front lines.

EPA-EFE/SERGEY DOLZHENKO

 

In Kyiv, 27 people were killed, including four children, Ukraine’s State Emergency Service said Tuesday. Two people were killed and at least 16 others were injured in the strike on Kyiv’s Okhmatdyt hospital. The facility is Ukraine’s largest children’s medical center and has been vital in the care of some of the sickest children from across the country.

 

Just to recall, Russia’s defense ministry claimed that its forces struck “military industrial facilities of Ukraine and air bases of the Ukrainian armed forces,” with long-range, high-precision weapons.

 

The Russian ministry also claimed that photos and videos from the Kyiv hospital blast confirmed the damage was caused by a Ukrainian air defense missile.