UKRAINE, KHARKIV, Aug. 3 — On Aug. 1, Russian forces attacked a storage building of the Ranok publishing house in Kharkiv. The attack destroyed millions of books, including school textbooks that were being prepared for delivery to schools before the start of the school year in September, Viktor Kruhlov, head of the Ranok publishing house, told Gwara Media.

Kruhlov said that two Russian jet-powered drones hit the storage building. A second Russian drone struck just minutes after the first, when employees had already begun trying to extinguish the fire.

Oleh Syniehubov, governor of the Kharkiv oblast, said that the attack injured one man, and another employee could not be found. Later, Kruhlov reported that the missing person had been found.

The building housed books belonging to the Ranok publishing house, the Knyholend bookstore chain, and publishing houses that are part of the RNK-Ranok publishing corporation, including Readberry, Zhorzh, Fabula, One More Page, Varvar Publishing, Osnova, Svoje, Korali Books, Kenhuru, and 4mamas.

Kruhlov told Ukrainian media Chytomo that 600,000 textbooks with 28,000 book titles and 8 million copies were destroyed in the attack. He estimated the damage to the publishing house at around 1 billion hryvnias ($24 million).

Since the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion, the Ranok publishing house has incurred losses of more than 60 million hryvnias ($1.4 million).

In 2024, Russia damaged Faktor-Druk, the biggest printing complex in Ukraine, with an S-300 missile, killing seven employees of the printing house and injuring 21. The attack burned down 50,000 books.

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