UN says Security Council to hold emergency Ukraine meeting

Emergency and rescue personnel along with medics and others clear the rubble of the destroyed building of Ohmatdyt Children's Hospital following a Russian missile attack in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv on July 8, 2024, amid Russian invasion of Ukraine. [AFP]

The UN Security Council will hold an emergency meeting on Ukraine on Tuesday after a deadly Russian strike on a Kyiv children's hospital, a spokesman for the world body said.

The session scheduled for 10:00 am (1400 GMT) follows a request from Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, UN spokesman Farhan Aziz Haq told AFP.

Zelensky said 38 people were killed and 190 wounded Monday in a wave of missiles that targeted towns and cities.

He said Kyiv was "initiating an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council due to the Russian strike on civilian infrastructure".

The UN said Tuesday there was a "high likelihood" that the children's hospital in the capital suffered "a direct hit" from a Russian missile.

Danielle Bell, head of the UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, called the strike "one of the most egregious attacks that we've seen since the onset of the full-scale invasion" by Russia in February 2022.