UN News Today 03 November 2026 |

Air raid alerts and attacks on schools: the devastating face of education in Ukraine

In Ukraine, after Monday’s deadly strike at a school being used to distribute aid in Zaporizhzhia region, the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) reported that there have been around 2,000 attacks on education since the full-scale Russian invasion in 2022.

Since the start of the academic year, air raid alarms have sounded for 34 hours on average during school time, the agency said. 

That’s equivalent to more than 13 per cent of scheduled learning time, to 20 October, with some regions impacted by 60-plus hours of alerts, said UNICEF spokesperson Ricardo Pires.

This year alone there have been some 270 attacks on education, he said:

“They are dealing with air raid alarms all the time, you could feel that some of them, especially the older ones, expressed a lot of anxiety and shared with us their…inability to fully concentrate and kind of leave what’s happening above ground.”

Meanwhile, the UN’s top aid official in Ukraine, Matthias Schmale, has condemned Monday’s attack on a school and shelter in Komyshuvakha that reportedly killed at least 29 civilians.

The majority of the victims were residents “who came to get aid at a local school and employees of the local administration”, said Mr Schmale, who’s the UN Resident Coordinator in Ukraine.

He said that subsequent strikes at the same location killed two rescuers and four police staff who responded to the first attack.

Nearly 50 people are still missing.

Myanmar: Children reported killed and injured in airstrikes 

Staying with UNICEF, which says that a Myanmar school has also been hit in an airstrike, with three children reported killed and five others injured.

The educational centre in Loikaw Township, Kayah state was being used by displaced families when it came under attack on Saturday, amid an ongoing civil war sparked by a coup in 2021.

Further airstrikes were reported in Rakhine state over the weekend, including one that struck a temporary healthcare facility, reportedly killing a newborn baby and healthcare workers.

“These reports are yet another stark reminder that children are bearing the brunt for the devastating conflict in Myanmar,” UNICEF said. It added that youngsters “are being killed and injured in the very places where they should be safe and protected,” with strikes also on health facilities.

The agency issued an appeal to all parties to the conflict to uphold their obligations under international humanitarian law and take all necessary measures to protect children. 

Yemen: deteriorating conditions for women and girls in Taiz

As fighting escalates in and around Taiz in Yemen, desperate stories of survival and impossible choices are playing out for women and girls, the sexual and reproductive health agency, UNFPA, warned on Tuesday.

In an alert from Yemen, the agency said that displacement from the west coast and Taiz has tripled since the war resumed in September, with nearly 300,000 people now uprooted from their homes and facing “extreme hardship”. 

More than half of those now seeking safety are women and children and one in three displaced families are headed by a woman.

Here’s the latest from Francesco Galtieri, UNFPA Representative in Yemen, who described the plight of one teenager:

“Safa is 14 years old. She fled fighting in Lahj. She told UNFPA that she had lost her mother earlier this year and had no siblings. Her father married her to an elderly man a few weeks ago because the father feared he would have no chance to protect Safa in case he had been found or killed.” 

In Taiz City, the rapidly deteriorating humanitarian situation is both a health and protection emergency, UNFPA warns. 

It reports that more than 13,000 pregnant women lack essential care, including 1,500 who are due to give birth within two weeks. 

In addition, only five out of 27 designated emergency maternal and neonatal hospitals are partially functioning.

At the UNFPA-supported Swedish Motherhood and Childhood Hospital, fuel shortages have forced a drastic reduction in the number of incubators for premature babies, from 40 to 10.

Midwives inside the city report that severely malnourished pregnant women are surviving on insufficiently nutritious food.

UNFPA says that is it still too dangerous to replenish essential reproductive health supplies.

Daniel Johnson, UN News