A Russian missile strike on a civilian building in Izium, eastern Ukraine, killed five people, including a pregnant woman, and injured over 50 others on Tuesday, February 4, 2025. The attack partially destroyed the city hall building in the center of Izium, a city in the Kharkiv region.
The governor of the Kharkiv region, Oleg Sinegubov, reported that 55 people were injured, including three children, several local government officials, and social service workers. Among the dead were two young people who were collecting documents at the passport office. "They were 18 and 19 years old, and one was pregnant," Sinegubov wrote on social media.
Larisa Shigrinets, who was in the local tax office when the air raid siren sounded, said the missile impact occurred seconds later. "Everything was covered in blood and the windows were shattered," the 51-year-old woman said. Several people arrived at the scene to identify the victims, whose bodies were lined up in bags on the pavement by the police.
Following the attack, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy declared that it is "impossible to accept this cruelty" and urged allies to increase pressure on Moscow to end the invasion. "We must pressure Russia and use all possible force: the force of weapons, the force of sanctions, and the force of diplomacy, to stop the terror and protect lives," he wrote on social media.
Zelenskyy confirmed that the city hall building was damaged in the attack. Sinegubov had previously indicated that a five-story residential building was also hit and that there were no military facilities in the area.
Izium, which had a population of approximately 45,000 people before the Russian invasion in February 2022, was occupied for several months at the start of the war before being liberated by Ukrainian forces later that year. The city is currently about 40 kilometers from the front line.