Foreign Ministry statement on the terrorist attack by the Kiev regime targeting civilians in the Kherson Region of the Russian Federation

Foreign Ministry statement on the terrorist attack by the Kiev regime targeting civilians in the Kherson Region of the Russian Federation:

In the early hours of January 1, 2026, the criminal neo-Nazi Kiev regime carried out a targeted attack using armed UAVs which took aim at a café and a hotel in Khorly, Kherson Region. Local residents were celebrating the New Year’s Eve there with their families. While the exact number of those who were killed and injured in these strikes and during the fire that they caused has yet to be established, it is already clear that several dozen civilians suffered in this attack, of whom 24 people died, including one minor.

Russia’s Investigative Committee has opened a criminal file on terrorist charges. Everyone who took part in this monstrous and bloody crime will be identified and would not be able to evade justice.

By perpetrating this barbarous atrocity, the Kiev regime has once again demonstrated its human-hating neo-Nazi nature. The Ukrainian Armed Forces attacked civilians with their drones hot on the heels of Zelensky perorations, as repeated during his New Year speech, on Kiev’s commitment to peace. We have long grown accustomed to this cynical posture, which transcends all possible boundaries and demonstrates that he has totally lost his moral bearings.

The Kiev usurper decided to target helpless civilians in his impotent range, against the backdrop of the successful advancement of the Russian Armed Forces and the losses suffered by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, as well as the failed attempt by the Ukrainian terrorists to carry out a strike against the President of the Russian Federation’s state residence in the Novgorod Region in the early hours of December 29, 2025. He is ready to kill women and children and to perpetrate crimes similar to what happened at the Trade Union House in Odessa for the sake of holding on to power and in an effort to intimidate people from the regions which have recently reunified with Russia by linking their destinies to it forever by holding referendums.

As for the attempts by the Kiev regime to target the Presidential residence in the Novgorod Region, these was a special technical review of a block from the navigation system of one of the Ukrainian drones which were downed in the Novgorod Region’s air space in the early hours of December 29, 2025. Members of the Russian special services have succeeded in extracting the file with the mission description, and these materials will be forwarded to the United States using the appropriate channels.

Every day, the Russian Defence Ministry’s air defence systems deflect drone attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces against the regions of Russia, including its capital – there were about 10 attacks of this kind today.

These attempts are designed to distract people in order to leave the frontline failures of the Ukrainian Armed Forces unnoticed. The Kiev regime has been trying, in vain, to prove its viability using terrorist attacks.

It is just as obvious that Office of the President of Ukraine on Bankovaya Street has been intentionally seeking to derail any attempts to find peaceful solutions.

This latest criminal strike against civilians in Khorly is a bloody atrocity by the Kiev clique. Western leaders who continue sponsoring the bankrupt regime with money and weapons bear full responsibility for this crime. The Foreign Ministry firmly condemns all the terrorist attacks by the Kiev regime.

We express our sincere condolences to the families and friends on the victims and wish the injured speedy recovery.

The Foreign Ministry calls on the governments of the responsible sovereign countries and the relevant international structures to publicly express their resolute condemnation of the bloody terrorist attack by the Kiev regime in the Kherson Region. Ignoring this tragedy would amount to only one thing – openly encouraging neo-Banderite terrorist crimes and acting as accomplices, which will be interpreted in legal terms with the corresponding legal consequences.

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