Russia says at least 18 killed in Ukrainian strike on college dormitory
By Tim Lister and Svitlana Vlasova, CNN
(CNN) — Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered retaliation to a deadly Ukrainian attack on what he said was a college dormitory in an occupied town which authorities say killed at least 18.
Putin accused Ukraine of a “terrorist” act after Ukrainian drones struck the dormitory in Starobilsk, an occupied town in eastern Luhansk on Friday.
The Russian president added that he had ordered the defense ministry to come up with proposals for a response to the Ukrainian strike.
The Russian state news agency Tass said Saturday that the death toll of “children killed in the Ukrainian drone strike” had risen to 18, citing Russia’s Ministry of Emergency Situations. A further three people are believed to be trapped under the rubble.
Such a toll from a Ukrainian attack would be very rare so far from the front lines and not targeting any obvious military facility.
But Ukraine’s military rejected Putin’s claim and accused Russian media of circulating “manipulative information” on the attack. It reiterated that it strikes “military infrastructure and facilities used for military purposes.”
The military added that among targets struck early Friday was “one of the headquarters of the ‘Rubicon’ unit in the Starobilsk area.”
The elite Rubicon Center for Advanced Unmanned Technologies has pioneered Russian drone technology and targeting since it was formed in 2024.
Ukraine has stepped up longer-range drone attacks in recent weeks. It claimed two attacks earlier this week on Russian military facilities in occupied territory earlier this week.
One wave of strikes hit a Russian drone pilot training camp in the occupied town of Snizhne, killing at least 65 cadets and an instructor on Wednesday night, according to the commander of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces.
Robert Brovdi, the commander of Ukraine’s Unmanned Systems Forces, claimed the strike targeted a 2,484-square-meter complex, which housed drones and explosives as well as a command post.
Footage posted on social media Wednesday night also showed a building ablaze in Snizhne, which CNN has geolocated to the same area as the drone training camp.
Another set of strikes hit a Russian security service headquarters and an air defense system in the Kherson region in occupied Ukraine, killing and wounding almost 100 Russians, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky claimed Thursday.
Ukrainian claims of such high casualty figures are unusual, and CNN cannot independently verify them. CNN approached Russian authorities for comment.
Ukraine has developed an arsenal of mid- and long-range drones capable of deep strikes on Russian military and energy infrastructure.
Zelensky said Saturday that the security services had struck “one of Russia’s important military-industrial enterprises” 1,700 kilometers (1,050 miles) inside Russia.
The target was a chemical plant in Perm Krai, Zelensky said, that provides a range of products to Russia’s military. He posted video purporting to show smoke rising from the facility.
The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.
