Father, three kids killed in Ukraine drone strike

 A Russian drone strike destroyed a home in Bohodukhiv, northeastern Kharkiv, Ukraine, killing a father and his three young children and seriously injuring their 35-week pregnant mother, officials said Wednesday. The 34-year-old father and his three children—a pair of 2-year-old twin boys and a 1-year-old daughter—died when the house collapsed and caught fire. Rescue workers pulled the mother from the rubble; she sustained blast injuries, burns, hearing loss, and a traumatic brain injury. Bohodukhiv Mayor Volodymyr Bielyi announced three days of mourning and described the attack as an immeasurable loss. He said the mother is fighting for her life in hospital and urged the community to remember the tragedy. The drone was identified as a Geran-2, a Russian-made version of the Iranian Shahed drone. The strike occurred amid almost four years of constant aerial attacks on Ukrainian civilians since Russia’s invasion. The UN Human Rights Monitoring Mission reported that 2025 was the deadliest year for civilians since 2022, with 2,514 killed and 12,142 injured—a 31% increase over 2024. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy condemned the attack on social media, emphasizing that repeated strikes undermine diplomatic efforts to end the war and reinforce the need for strong pressure on Russia and clear security guarantees for Ukraine. According to the Ukrainian Air Force, Russia launched 129 long-range drones across Ukraine overnight. In a related development, a Ukrainian drone strike caused a fire at an industrial plant in Volgograd, Russia, damaging an apartment building. Authorities reported that eight Russian airports briefly suspended flights due to drone attacks. Bohodukhiv, located about 22 kilometers from the Russian border with a pre-war population of 15,000, now faces the aftermath of this deadly strike. Bielyi expressed the town’s collective grief, stating, “We will endure. We will remember. We will never forgive this horror on our land.” The attack underscore