At least six people killed in Ukrainian missile attack on Russia’s Belgorod

Overview

At least six people were killed and four others, including a 14-year-old, were wounded in a Ukrainian missile strike on western Russia's Belgorod region, according to acting Belgorod Governor Alexander Shuvaev. The attack hit the village of Koloskovo in the Valuysky district, about 15km (10 miles) from Ukraine's northeastern border. Shuvaev said a structure was "burned" and a vehicle damaged.

At the same time, Russian forces launched missile and drone attacks across Ukraine, killing at least four people and wounding 19, according to Ukrainian authorities and emergency services.

Ukrainian strike on Belgorod

Shuvaev, speaking on the state-backed MAX platform, said the Ukrainian attack on Monday struck Koloskovo. The village is located in the Valuysky district of the Belgorod region, which borders northeastern Ukraine. The reported death toll of six and injuries include cases in which a 14-year-old is stated to have been wounded. The acting governor said a structure caught fire and a vehicle was damaged.

Russian attacks on Ukraine

Across Ukraine, overnight military action by Russian forces resulted in at least four deaths and 19 injuries, as reported by Ukrainian authorities.

At least two people were killed and four injured in an attack on the southeastern region of Zaporizhia. Two people were killed and one wounded in Sumy in northeastern Ukraine, according to emergency services. At least five people were injured in a strike on central Ukraine's Dnipropetrovsk region. In the Kharkiv region, four people were injured after two Russian guided-bomb attacks hit Izyum, as reported by the Izium City Council on Telegram.

Specifically, the Iium City Council reported that at approximately 4:05 a.m. on August 23, 2026, Russian troops struck the city of Izium with three guided aerial bombs. One strike in the northern part of the city damaged about 10 private residential buildings, and two strikes in the Verkhne Selishche area caused a fire in a farm building covering about 20 square meters and damaged about 10 more private houses. Approximately 20 private buildings, vehicles, and power lines were affected, and two people were injured and receiving medical care. In Kharkiv, a Russian drone struck a private home, injuring four people.

In the southern Kherson region, five people were injured in an attack. In the Odesa region, a strike targeted port infrastructure in the Izmail district, damaging a Togo-flagged civilian vessel and starting fires that have since been extinguished, according to Ukrainian authorities. Izmail is close to the Romanian border and home to Ukraine's largest port on the Danube River.

Broader context

These attacks occurred a day after Russia and Ukraine carried out a wave of missile and drone strikes deep inside each other's territory, killing 19 people in each country.

Front-line fighting remains at a near standstill, and US-backed talks aiming to end the conflict are frozen. The two foes have stepped up missile attacks, pushing the civilian death toll to its highest levels since the early months of the war in 2022. Russia has conducted near-daily attacks across Ukraine since the full-scale invasion began in February 2022. In recent months, it has intensified attacks with ballistic missiles, which are difficult to intercept, exploiting the need for air defense equipment following a global increase in demand linked to conflicts in the Middle East, as reported.

Meanwhile, Ukraine has targeted warehouses belonging to Russia's largest online retailer, Wildberries, claiming the company sells components for Russian drones as well as supplies for its soldiers. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said these strikes along with attacks on oil refineries aim to undermine Russia's war economy.

The recent casualty figures reflect a dramatic toll: UN monitors confirmed 1,396 Ukrainian civilians killed and 7,978 injured in the first half of 2026. July was the deadliest month for civilians in Ukraine since April 2022, according to the UN's humanitarian aid office, with 437 killed. Russian authorities reported 79 civilians killed in Ukrainian attacks in July, up from the previous month.

Earlier this week, on Thursday, Russian ballistic missile strikes killed at least 17 people and wounded dozens more in and around the capital Kyiv. The strike hit a nine-story apartment in the Solomianskyi district, setting the upper floors alight and killing seven. The events prompted a UN Security Council meeting where spokesman Stéphane Dujarric said attacks against civilians and infrastructure are a clear violation of international humanitarian law and must stop. UN Secretary-General António Guterres also expressed condemnation.