Eight people are still hospitalised in Kyiv after a shooting that left six people dead, Mayor Vitali Klitschko said on Sunday. Among those hospitalised is a child; the mayor said the child’s parents were killed in the attack.
According to officials, a Russian-born man opened fire on passersby with an automatic rifle on Saturday before forcing his way into a supermarket and taking hostages. Police said the suspect was shot dead by officers after they stormed the supermarket, following about 40 minutes of unsuccessful negotiations.
Klitschko said the wounded child is in moderate condition, while one of the adults remains in critical condition. President Volodymyr Zelenskiy earlier reported that 14 people had been injured in the incident, which took place in the leafy Holosiivskyi district of the capital.
"They are all receiving all necessary medical care," the mayor wrote on Telegram.
The supermarket where the attacker barricaded himself has been sealed off and remains closed. Witnesses and onlookers reported visible signs of the violence: bullet holes in the supermarket windows and traces of blood on the pavement and asphalt outside.
Flowers have been placed near a residential building a couple of hundred metres from the supermarket. That location is where the perpetrator is reported to have shot his initial victims.
Local residents described scenes of panic. Daryna, a 31-year-old who lives nearby, told reporters she saw people grabbing children from a playground and running. "They screamed: 'run away, hide.' People didn’t understand what was going on. They said that there was a man there, a man was shooting with a machine gun," she said.
An older resident, described as a 73-year-old pensioner, said the man he witnessed shooting bystanders "looked kind of smart." He added: "I don’t want to clear him of blame or anything like that... but he didn’t look like a killer."
Shootings of this kind are described as extremely rare in Ukraine. The country’s security service said the incident is being investigated as a terrorist act. Police have not yet established a motive for the crime.
Context for businesses and services
The immediate fallout has affected the supermarket that was the scene of the siege, which remains cordoned off and closed to customers. Hospitals in the area are treating multiple wounded, and security services are conducting a criminal investigation while probing the possible terrorist classification of the attack.
The events underline an array of uncertainties that remain unresolved as investigations continue.