WHO says key warehouse destroyed by attack in Ukraine

The World Health Organization said Friday that one of its main warehouses in Ukraine had been destroyed in air attack -- the third such incident in three months.

The WHO warned that it was part of a wider pattern of attacks on humanitarian facilities in Ukraine.

"In the past three months, three warehouses used by WHO in different regions of Ukraine have been destroyed by airstrikes, ruining essential medical supplies intended for frontline and hard-to-reach areas," the WHO's Europe branch said in a statement.

Early on Thursday, "an air attack in Kyiv region destroyed one of WHO's main warehouses storing humanitarian medical supplies.

"Access to the site remains restricted due to heavy smoke and safety concerns, while assessments of possible damage and stock losses are ongoing. No WHO personnel were affected."

The WHO said this came after an attack two weeks ago in Dnipro which completely destroyed one of its humanitarian warehouses. That resulted in the loss of half of the medical supplies and equipment intended to support an estimated 225,000 people.

And another warehouse used by WHO in the Kyiv region was damaged during a large-scale wave of attacks on the capital and the wider region in July, it added.

"In my understanding, all warehouses, all UN locations, all WHO locations are deconflicted," WHO spokesman Christian Lindmeier told reporters in Geneva.

That means their whereabouts are clearly communicated to all sides in an armed conflict.

The attacks are part of a broader pattern affecting humanitarian operations across the country, the UN health agency said.

It said that while the UN aid agency OCHA had counted at least 20 attacks on warehouses storing humanitarian supplies in 2026, the WHO itself had verified 15 attacks on warehouses holding health-related supplies so far this year.

The WHO verifies and records attacks on healthcare but does not attribute blame as it is not an investigation agency.

"Right now, our teams are spending valuable time and resources moving supplies from site to site to keep them safe; time and resources that should go into delivering health care, not protecting it from attack," said Silviu Domente, the WHO's representative to Ukraine.

"We are deeply concerned by the growing pattern of attacks on health in Ukraine, including on humanitarian storage facilities."

The WHO has verified more than 3,000 attacks on health care in Ukraine since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022.

Health facilities and the health system at large fall under the protection of international humanitarian and rights law.