Ukrainian authorities said that the interior minister of Ukraine and three children were among the 18 individuals killed in a helicopter crash on Wednesday in a neighborhood of Kyiv.
According to Ihor Klymenko, chief of Ukraine’s National Police, among those slain were Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskyi, his deputy Yevhen Yenin, and State Secretary of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Yurii Lubkovych. Monastyrskyi is the highest-ranking Ukrainian official to have perished since the conflict with Russia began roughly 11 months ago.
According to Klymenko, nine people were murdered when an emergency services helicopter crashed in Brovary, an eastern suburb of Kyiv.
Three children were also slain, according to Kyiv Regional Governor Oleksii Kuleba. Officials and media reports had previously stated that the chopper had crashed near a kindergarten.
There was no early news on whether the crash was an accident or the result of Russia’s conflict. There has been no recent combat in the Kyiv area.
According to the regional governor, 29 individuals were hurt, including 15 children.
Ukraine’s first lady, Olena Zelenska, cried and squeezed her nose before attending a World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland.
After the session began, Forum President Borge Brende requested 15 seconds of silence to honor the Ukrainian officials lost in the tragedy.
The disaster occurred only four days after a Russian missile attack on an apartment building in southern Ukraine killed 45 civilians, including six children – the bloodiest attack on civilians since the spring.
“Haven’t had time to recover from one tragedy — there is already another one,” said Kyrylo Tymoshenko, deputy head of the Ukrainian presidential office.