On Aug 4, 2026, President Volodymyr Zelensky shared a chilling video on Telegram that shows a Russian drone hunting a Ukrainian street vendor in the Kherson region.
The footage, taken in the Tavriiskyi district beside a busy roundabout, follows the drone as it hovers above a vendor named Yuriy, a 52‑year‑old man selling vegetables. Yuriy tries to flee and hides behind a white van, but the drone keeps its focus, ultimately diving in and detonating on impact. He survives with a concussion, multiple shrapnel wounds, and a destroyed van, as reported by his treating doctor.
"The world must see this," Zelensky wrote on Telegram, calling the incident a “barbaric war crime.” Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha echoed the sentiment, describing the attack as part of a deliberate Russian campaign to intimidate civilians. “The sadist operating this drone knows full well that he is targeting a civilian,” he said, demanding formal international condemnation.
BBC Verify geolocated the video to the market space beside the roundabout in the Tavriiskyi district. The earliest public copy surfaced on a pro‑Ukrainian Instagram account early Tuesday morning. The video, which shows the drone’s final descent, aligns with a 2025 UN report documenting recurring Russian drone attacks on civilians near the front line.
The UN warned that posting such footage constitutes a war crime under the “outrages upon personal dignity” statute. These so‑called “human safaris” aim to terrorize residents in frontline areas of Kherson, a region just miles from battle zones.
For more on this story, see the related coverage: Russian drones hunt civilians, evidence suggests.
