Three hand grenades were detonated during a Ukrainian meeting, killing 26 and critically injuring six.

The grenades were detonated by village council member Serhii Batryn, who died during the explosions. It is reported that he belongs to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s Servant of the People party.

The meeting was to discuss raising the community budget. The killer showed up to the meeting nearly 1.5 hours late and waited by the door until he dropped the three grenades on the ground.

The meeting was streamed live on Facebook. During the meeting, the stream shows that the killer stood next to the door before dropping the grenades in front of him.

He reportedly had access to these grenades because of the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine, which is ongoing and has resulted in many deaths.

Investigators debate what type of war violation this act of violence is. The first violation could involve mishandling war weapons, namely “Art. 263—illegal handling of weapons, ammunition or explosives of the criminal code.” A second violation could involve terrorism, specifically “Part 1 of Article 258 (terrorist act) of the Criminal Code.”

This attack has mostly brought out questions about the illegal handling of weapons.

It is unknown what the motive was and whether this grenade attack was connected to the war against Russia. Russia has been attacking Ukraine because it does not want a NATO force bordering them.

So far, there have been 500,000 or more deaths between Russian and Ukrainian people as of the end of 2023.

Although Ukraine has lost fewer total people, Russia outnumbers Ukrainian soldiers three to one. Russia also has a bigger population of people to replenish their troops with. This means Ukraine has had a bigger loss in its population than Russia has.

It is believed that Ukraine only has around 500,000 soldiers, while Russia has around 1,330,000 active soldiers.

This recent attack is one of hundreds that likely are a result of this war.