Ukraine's National Police has released video footage showing a Russian drone targeting a civilian at a farmers' market in Kherson, southern Ukraine. {claim:14}

The footage shows a drone chasing a 52-year-old man who was selling vegetables and fruit. {claim:2,3}

The man survived the attack but sustained a concussion, blast injuries, and shrapnel wounds. {claim:4}

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy described the footage as evidence of a Russian 'drone safari' against civilians, stating that a drone hunted a man selling vegetables and detonated next to him. {claim:17,18}

This is exactly how the Russians are fighting their war — they deliberately target civilians.
— Ukraine's National Police

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha branded the drone's pilot a 'sadist' and accused them of knowingly targeting a civilian. {claim:5}

Sybiha stated that the incident in Kherson demands international justice and condemnation, noting that many similar crimes do not reach the public eye. {claim:6}

The National Police noted the man showed no signs of being a combatant. {claim:16}

Ukrainian police stated that Russian forces use drones against emergency workers, vehicles, public transport, and civilians in Kherson almost every day. {claim:20}

In the Kherson region, 18 civilians were injured and two were killed on a Sunday. {claim:21}

Casualty trends and regional strikes

The U.N. Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine reported that civilian deaths in the first half of 2026 increased by 37 percent compared to 2025 and more than doubled 2024 records. {claim:9}

1,396 deaths

Civilian deaths recorded by the U.N. Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine during the first six months of 2026.

In Sumy, regional governor Oleh Hryborov confirmed on X that an elderly woman and two children were killed during Russian guided bomb strikes overnight. {claim:10}

In Russia, Veniamin Kondratyev, the governor of the Krasnodar region, described a drone debris incident in Gelendzhik as a 'deliberate strike' by Kyiv that killed seven people. {claim:11}

However, Andriy Kovalenko, head of the Ukrainian government’s Center for Countering Disinformation, attributed the Gelendzhik incident to Russian air defense forces shooting down a drone over a beach. {claim:12}

Since the start of the war in February 2022, both Ukraine and Russia have denied targeting civilians. {claim:13}

The Kherson region remains partially occupied by Russian forces on the left bank of the Dnipro River. {claim:22}