Russian ballistic missiles struck a Ukrainian defense-industry gathering on the outskirts of Kyiv on Friday, killing at least 10 people and wounding nearly 100, one day after President Volodymyr Zelenskyy hosted senior representatives of Raytheon, the U.S. maker of the Patriot air-defense system, in the capital.
The strike hit a privately operated military training site in the Bucha district, about 12 to 19 miles from central Kyiv, that was hosting a drone-technology exhibition. It landed four days before Zelenskyy's scheduled Tuesday meeting with President Trump in Washington, a session the White House said was aimed at reviving stalled peace talks between Kyiv and Moscow.
Three missiles, one intercepted
Ukrainian air force spokesman Yuri Ihnat told Ukrainian television that Russia fired three ballistic missiles and that only one was intercepted. Acting regional military administration head Ruslan Oliinyk said 27 homes and 44 vehicles were also damaged. The Ukrainian Defense Industry Council, the country's largest association of private defense manufacturers, confirmed industry representatives were at the site when the missiles struck.
The BBC reported the event was at least the third defense-industry gathering hit since Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022. Defense Ministry adviser Serhiy Beskrestnov and drone-technology developer Lyuba Shypovych both said on social media that they were unharmed; Beskrestnov said he had stayed away over security concerns.
Two Ukrainian investigations
Ukraine's prosecutor general, Ruslan Kravchenko, opened a war-crimes investigation into the strike and a separate criminal case over possible negligence in organizing the event. Investigators will examine who approved its location, timing and format and whether adequate precautions were taken, Kravchenko said. Ukraine imposed reporting restrictions on the attack.
Patriots on the agenda
Zelenskyy met Thursday in Kyiv with a Raytheon delegation and said on social media that the company was ready to jointly produce Patriot interceptors with Ukraine. "Missiles for Patriot systems are the number one priority," he wrote. Raytheon did not respond to an AP inquiry about whether any of its workers had attended Friday's event. The meeting followed Trump's pledge less than three weeks ago to grant Ukraine a license to produce Patriots, though Kyiv officials and outside experts have cautioned that setting up production could take years.
Trump ally Laura Loomer, who interviewed Zelenskyy in Kyiv on Thursday, said the Ukrainian president planned to attend U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham's funeral during the Washington trip.
Russia's Defense Ministry acknowledged the strike, saying it had used "high-precision long-range weaponry" on a site where drones "for use in targeting civil sites in Russia" were being demonstrated and where producers and members of Ukraine's drone forces and security services were present. No independent verification of the attendee list has been reported; the sharpest criticism of holding a publicly advertised defense event during wartime came from inside Ukraine, in the parallel negligence probe Kravchenko opened alongside the war-crimes case.
Zelenskyy meets Trump at the White House on Tuesday.