Russia Claims Hitting Training Center, Neutralizing 80 'Foreign Mercenaries' In Ukraine

The Russian Defense Ministry said on Monday it has hit with high-precision cruise missiles a training center for "foreign mercenaries and nationalists units" in Ukraine's Rivne Oblast and neutralized over 80 mercenaries.

"On the night of March 21, a training center for foreign mercenaries and Ukrainian nationalist formations, located at the Nova Lyubomirka training ground in Rivne Oblast, was hit with high-precision cruise missiles.

"Over 80 mercenaries and nationalists were neutralized. Also, an ammunition depot and a command point of a mechanized infantry near Selets settlement were hit with high-precision cruise missiles from the air," the ministry's spokesman Igor Konashenkov said at a daily briefing in Moscow.

In the suburbs of Kyiv, in Nikolayevka settlement, the Russian military also captured a command point of Ukraine's armed forces, Konashenkov continued.

Konashenkov said: "61 Ukrainian servicemen of the control center voluntarily surrendered, and more than half of them are senior officers of the armed forces of Ukraine."

In addition, the Russian armed forces took under control Solodke settlement in the Donetsk region and continued crushing groups of nationalists in Donbas, he said.

A group of "night hunters" consisting of Ka-52 and Mi-28N helicopters destroyed eight tanks, four infantry fighting vehicles, and three armored personnel carriers during night strikes, Konashenkov added.

"During the night, 44 military facilities of Ukraine were hit by tactical and army aviation, including four command posts, two installations of multiple rocket launchers in the areas of the settlements of Nalivaykivka and Zolochiv, six Buk M-1 air defense systems, three Msta-B artillery guns in the Vyshhorod area, four warehouses of rocket and artillery weapons and ammunition, as well as 23 places of accumulation of military equipment.

"And also, 216 unmanned aerial vehicles, 180 air defense systems, 1,506 tanks and other armored combat vehicles, 152 multiple rocket launchers, 592 field artillery, and mortar guns, as well as 1,284 units of special military vehicles have been destroyed," the spokesman said.

Ammonia leak

Konashenkov called "a planned provocation" the leak of ammonia at one of Ukraine's biggest chemical industry plants, SumyHimProm, in the city of Sumy.

The spokesman reminded that the ministry officially warned on March 19 that the plant was mined "by Ukrainian nationalists to commit a provocation in order to accuse Russia of allegedly using 'chemical weapons'."

Konashenkov said there is no threat to the residents of the city since the air masses were moving "not towards the city."

"I would like to emphasize once again that the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation did not plan and do not strike any Ukrainian facilities for the storage or production of toxic substances," he stressed.

The Russia-Ukraine war, which started on Feb. 24, has drawn international condemnation, led to financial restrictions on Moscow, and spurred an exodus of global firms from Russia.

At least 900 civilians have been killed and 1,459 injured in Ukraine since the beginning of the war, said the UN, noting conditions on the ground make it difficult to verify the exact number.

More than 3.32 million people have also fled to neighboring countries, said the UN refugee agency. -