Rescuers and victims killed in Zaporizhzhia as truce ends

At least 26 people died in Russian strikes on a village in Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region on Monday, Ukrainian officials announced. The death toll includes aid recipients, rescue workers, and police officers. The attacks occurred immediately after a local ceasefire in the neighboring Kherson region expired on Sunday.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stated that aerial bombs hit a school while people gathered for a weekly humanitarian distribution. A second attack then struck the shelter. Video from Ukraine's emergency services showed rescuers clearing smoldering debris where the structure had stood. Zelensky argued the preceding truce had shown peace could advance, but the killings sent the opposite message.

Acting regional governor Mykhailo Semikin identified two rescue workers and four police officers among the dead. The emergency service named the rescuers as Denys Konovalenko and Oleksy Sushchevsky, both 44 years old. The service noted they had regularly worked in dangerous conditions to save others.

The ceasefire, brokered by US First Lady Melania Trump, ran from Tuesday until Sunday. It allowed a humanitarian mission in Russian-occupied Oleshky. Neither side reported violations during the pause. Residents evacuated to Ukrainian-controlled territory and Moscow-annexed Crimea. Kyiv said Russia resumed attacks on Kherson after the agreement expired.

A senior Ukrainian official told AFP on Sunday that Moscow rejected Kyiv's proposal to extend the truce. Ukrainian military sources accused Russian forces of using the interval to strengthen their positions. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov did not deny that accusation on Monday. He described such activity as normal and alleged Ukrainian troops had previously used pauses to regroup.

Peskov called the Oleshky mission successful and praised cooperation among participants. He specifically named Russian human rights commissioner Yana Lantratova, who supervised the ceasefire with Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Lubinets. The Kremlin said no comparable missions are currently planned. The war, now in its fifth year, has killed hundreds of thousands of people and displaced millions.

Diplomatic efforts continue next week. US special envoy Steve Witkoff said American-led negotiations will resume in Abu Dhabi on November 10 and 11. President Donald Trump has sought a settlement without achieving a breakthrough. Kyiv and European allies have expressed concern that he has increasingly aligned with Moscow. Separately, Ukraine and Russia reported overnight that emergency warning applications were hacked in apparent cyberattacks. Ukrainian authorities suspected their air raid alert system was compromised after millions received false radiation warnings. Russia reported a hack affecting an app operated by its emergency situations ministry. That app has limited use in Russia, where alerts about Ukrainian drone attacks are generally delivered through text messages in border areas.