Updated on: April 18, 2026 / 7:19 PM EDT / CBS/AP
A gunman who killed at least six people in Kyiv and then took hostages inside a supermarket was shot and killed by police after a tactical unit stormed the store, Ukrainian officials said Saturday. Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said the special tactical police moved in after negotiators failed to secure the release of the hostages.
Klymenko told reporters the attacker, born in 1968, shot and killed four people on the street before entering the supermarket and killing a fifth person there. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said a sixth victim, a young woman, later died of her injuries in hospital. An Associated Press reporter at the scene saw bodies on the street covered with emergency blankets before they were removed.
Police negotiators spoke with the suspect for roughly 40 minutes, Klymenko said. A female negotiator, wearing body armor and positioned behind an armored vehicle, used a loudspeaker to urge him to release hostages and talk, saying the people inside were not to blame and asking him to let them go. Klymenko said authorities knew there was likely a wounded person inside and even offered to bring tourniquets to stop bleeding, but the attacker did not respond. He said that when negotiations failed the order was given to neutralize the suspect, who resisted arrest and was killed.
Klymenko said the assailant was armed with a carbine, a short-barrel assault rifle that had been legally registered. Authorities said the man had applied last December to renew his weapons permit as it was expiring, submitted a medical certificate and asked to have the weapon test-fired. Officials said investigators will determine which medical institution issued the certificate.
The shooting took place in Kyiv’s Holosiivskyi district. Television footage showed police taking cover inside the shopping mall that houses the supermarket as shots were fired and bystanders were escorted away.
The attack came amid ongoing exchanges of strikes between Russia and Ukraine. Local Ukrainian officials reported a civilian killed in Donetsk and at least 26 people wounded in overnight attacks across northern and eastern regions, including a strike affecting port infrastructure in Odesa. Russian regional authorities reported fires at oil facilities following strikes in several regions. Ukraine’s General Staff said it struck major oil refineries in Novokuibyshevsk and Syzran in Russia’s Samara region and caused fires at the Vystosk oil terminal in Leningrad region and an oil refinery in Krasnodar; Russian officials later confirmed some blazes. Russia’s Defense Ministry reported destroying 258 Ukrainian drones overnight over 16 Russian regions, the annexed Crimean peninsula and the Black and Azov seas.