Newborn baby killed in overnight rocket strike on Ukrainian maternity hospital

A newborn baby has been killed in an overnight rocket attack on that struck a hospital maternity ward in southern Ukraine.

The child’s mother and a doctor were pulled alive from the rubble in the city of Vilniansk, Ukrainian authorities said.

The region’s governor said the rockets were Russian.

The strike adds to the gruesome toll suffered by hospitals and other medical facilities as the Russian invasion of Ukraine enters its tenth month.

Patients and staff at health facilities have been in the firing line from the outset, including an air strike on March 9 that destroyed a maternity hospital in the now-occupied port city of Mariupol.

Regional governor, Oleksandr Starukh, writing on the Telegram messaging app, said: “At night, Russian monsters launched huge rockets at the small maternity ward of the hospital in Vilniansk.

“Grief overwhelms our hearts — a baby was killed who had just seen the light of day. Rescuers are working at the site.”

Photos he posted show thick smoke rising above mounds of rubble, being combed by emergency workers against the backdrop of a dark night sky.

The state emergency service initially said a baby was killed and that a new mother and a doctor were pulled from the rubble, and that they were the only people in the ward at the time.

The service specified in a follow-up post on Telegram that the rescued woman was the newborn’s mother.