Drone attack injures Ukrainian vegetable vendor in Kherson, officials say

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky has shared a video on social media showing a drone pursuing a civilian street vendor in the southern Kherson region. In a post on Telegram, he said the footage illustrated what he called a Russian “safari” attack against civilians.

The video shows the drone hovering above a man who appears to be selling vegetables from a van at a market area. The man moves around, trying to evade the drone, crouching behind the vehicle as it follows him. The drone then dives at him and explodes, causing injuries.

“The world must see this,” Zelensky wrote. “It must see every piece of evidence that Russia has gone mad, and every fact that Russian soldiers are enjoying killings and tormenting people.”

Ukraine's Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha described the attack as a “barbaric war crime”. He said such “safaris” were a “deliberate and systemic Russian strategy”. He added, “The sadist operating this drone knows full well that he is targeting a civilian.”

The Kherson regional governor later released a video of the victim, identified as Yuriy, a 52-year-old vendor, speaking from a hospital bed. Yuriy said he and his wife were setting up crates of vegetables when he heard the drone's distinctive buzzing sound. His wife ran away, and the drone turned towards him. He held up garlic heads towards the drone's camera to signal he was not filming it.

“It could see that I had tomatoes out, some cucumbers and eggplants laid out on the floor,” Yuriy said. “It even ducked under the umbrella when I was running away round the other side.” The drone then struck him, causing a concussion, trauma, and multiple shrapnel wounds, according to his doctor. His van was destroyed.

BBC Verify geolocated the video to a market space beside a roundabout in the Tavriiskyi district in northern Kherson. The city of Kherson sits a few miles from the front line, and such drone attacks have been reported frequently in the area.

A 2025 United Nations report said it had found that Russian armed forces “recurrently killed and injured civilians” in the region by using drones to target them. The UN also noted that videos filmed by drones before detonation are often posted online, allowing many to witness the final moments of victims. “Posting videos of civilians being killed and injured amounts to the war crime of outrages upon personal dignity,” the UN said.

Russian authorities have not yet commented on the specific incident. The claim of a “safari” strategy is made by Ukrainian officials and has been documented in UN reports, but it remains a point of contention in the broader conflict.