By Pavel Polityuk

KYIV (Reuters) -Russia attacked a hospital in Sumy in northeastern Ukraine early on Saturday, killing nine people and injuring at least 19 others, Ukrainian and U.N. officials said.

Danielle Bell, head of the U.N. Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, said “loitering munitions” – or suicide drones – hit the Saint Panteleimon Clinical Hospital in two attacks 45 minutes apart.

“Most of the fatalities occurred during the second strike, which hit as first responders arrived at the site and patients attempted to evacuate,” she said.

Sumy City Council said 22 people sought medical help and 20 were listed as injured in the drone attacks, which it said damaged nine high-rise buildings in addition to the hospital.

By late on Saturday, its website said 14 people were in hospital, six of them in a serious condition.

Bell said she had been in Sumy last week following up on a deadly Sept. 19 attack on a geriatric centre in which at least one civilian had been killed and 13 injured, and recalled an Aug. 13 attack on another hospital complex in the city.

“Medical facilities are protected under international humanitarian law and are entitled to special protection. They must not be the object of attack,” she said, adding that 33 civilians had been killed and 132 injured in Sumy city and the surrounding region since Aug. 6.

Ukrainian prosecutors said that at the time of the Saturday morning attacks 86 patients and 38 staff members were in the hospital.

DRONE ATTACKS

The hospital shared a photograph on its Facebook (NASDAQ:) page it said showed one of those killed, a nurse and mother of two daughters named Tatiana Tikhonova.

“The first attack killed one person and damaged the ceilings of several floors of the hospital,” Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said on Telegram.

The State Emergency Service of Ukraine said on Facebook that nine people were killed, including an employee of the national police, and 20 others were injured.

“Everyone in the world who talks about this war should pay attention to where Russia is hitting. They are fighting hospitals, civilian objects and people’s lives,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Telegram.

“Only force can force Russia to peace. Peace through force is the only right way.”

Klymenko did not specify what weapons were used in Saturday’s attacks. The regional administration and air forces said the strike was carried out by drones, which Bell identified as loitering munitions.

Attacks on Sumy city and the Sumy region have become more frequent since Ukrainian forces launched an operation in Russia’s Kursk region in August and captured dozens of settlements.

Sumy city is located just 32 km (20 miles) from the Russian border, and Russian forces, which began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, have been attacking the region and the city with drones and guided bombs.