A nine-year-old Ukrainian girl, her mother and another woman were killed in a Russian missile strike on Kyiv today after the air raid shelter they rushed to failed to open, witnesses said.
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy expressed frustration at the miscue and said that if local officials were unable to provide protection, they could be prosecuted.
His comments appear to be aimed at Kyiv city authorities and Mayor Vitali Klitschko, with whom he has periodically clashed during the war.
Police opened a criminal investigation into the three deaths near a medical clinic in the Desnyanskyi district of Kyiv after the 18th attack on the capital since the start of last month.
"Three people, one of them a child, died near the clinic," Mr Klitschko said.
"A rocket fragment fell near the entrance to the clinic four minutes after the air alert was announced. And people headed for the shelter."
Residents said people were unable to enter the shelter because it was closed. It was not clear why.
"The air alert sounded. My wife took our daughter and they ran to the entrance here," local resident Yaroslav Ryabchuk said.
"The entrance was closed, there were already maybe five to ten women with children. No one opened up for them."
The case prompted calls for residents to check shelters and report safety violations.
Local media said prosecutors searched city administration offices as part of the investigation.
President Zelensky, in his nightly video message, said shelters "must be kept accessible.
Never again should we see a repeat of the situation that occurred last night in Kyiv."
This was "very clearly" the duty of local authorities "and if this duty is not fulfilled at the local level, it is the direct duty of law enforcement bodies to prosecute".
In earlier comments to reporters, Mr Zelensky said that as well as facing the Russian enemy, "we also have internal ones".
He said the response could be a "knockout" blow, a veiled dig at Mr Klitschko, a former heavyweight boxing champion.
At a makeshift memorial for the girl, another parent woken by the attacks spoke of her terror.
"I grabbed my child and ran into the corridor because I didn't have any other options. We sat there the whole time, there were a few more explosions," said Oleksandra, 25, visiting the memorial with her five-year-old son Hryhoriy.
"My child got really scared, he sat in the corner of our corridor. He cried, saying that we're all gonna die. I was terrified to hear this from him. It was terrible."
Russia has denied targeting civilians or committing war crimes though its air strikes have caused devastation in cities across Ukraine since the full-scale invasion on 24 February last year.
Ukraine reported no major damage from today's attack, saying it had shot down all ten missiles.
But, in a statement on International Children's Day, United Nations human rights monitors in Ukraine said 525 children had been killed since the invasion began.
Meanwhile, Russia said it had repelled more cross-border attacks from Ukraine.
The Russian defence ministry said its troops thwarted three attempted incursions near the western town of Shebekino, killing 30 Ukrainian fighters and destroying four armoured vehicles.
Earlier, the Russian Volunteer Corps (RVC), a far-right paramilitary group of ethnic Russians that supports Ukraine, said it was fighting inside Russia.
Kyiv denies direct involvement but Moscow accuses it of masterminding the raids.
Belgorod regional governor Vyacheslav Gladkov said Ukraine's armed forces had repeatedly shelled Shebekino with Soviet-designed Grad 122mm rockets, setting alight a dormitory and damaging an administrative building.
At least nine civilians were injured, he said, with hundreds of children, women and elderly being evacuated. Unverified video showed a fire at a large building in Shebekino.
The Kremlin has accused Ukraine - and its Western backers - of being behind the increasing number of reported attacks.
On Tuesday, the foreign ministry said the West was "pushing the Ukrainian leadership towards increasingly reckless acts" after a drone attack on residential areas in Moscow.
At least three buildings were slightly damaged, including two high-rise residential buildings in Moscow's affluent southwest.
Ukraine denied any "direct involvement".
The United States said it did not support any attack inside Russia, instead providing Kyiv with equipment and training to reclaim its territory.
The Defence Department said yesterday the fresh aid shipments would bring the total value of US security assistance to Ukraine since Russia's February 2022 invasion to $37.6 billion.
Also yesterday, Berlin said it had ordered four of Russia's five consulates in Germany to close.
The move comes after Moscow put a limit of 350 on the number of German government personnel allowed in Russia, a decision that Berlin says would force hundreds of civil servants and local employees to leave the country.
