MOSCOW, July 30, (AP): A Russian missile hit a Ukrainian army training ground, killing three soldiers and wounding 18 others, authorities said, in the latest attack to embarrass military officials as they struggle to make up a severe manpower shortage in the nearly 3½-year war. The Russian Defense Ministry said that the strike killed or wounded about 200 Ukrainian troops.

The ministry said that Ukraine’s 169th training center near Honcharivske in the Chernihiv region was hit with two Iskander missiles, one armed with multiple submunitions and another with high explosives. Meanwhile, Russia continued its stepped-up aerial campaign against Ukrainian civilian targets, launching 78 attack drones overnight, including up to eight newly developed jet-powered drones, Ukraine’s air force said Wednesday.

At least five people were wounded. The UN mission in Ukraine says there has been a worsening trend in civilian casualties from Russian attacks this year, with 6,754 civilians killed or injured in the first half of 2025 - representing a 54% increase from the same period in 2024. Since Russia launched an all-out invasion of neighboring Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022, at least 13,580 Ukrainian civilians, including 716 children, have been killed, according to the UN. In an effort to stop that, US President Donald Trump said Tuesday he's giving Russian President Vladimir Putin until Aug 8 for peace efforts to make progress or Washington will impose punitive sanctions and tariffs.

Western leaders have accused Putin of dragging his feet in US-led peace efforts in an attempt to capture more Ukrainian land. Ukrainian forces are mostly hanging on against a grinding summer push by Russia’s bigger army, though the Russian Defense Ministry has claimed some recent small advances at places along the 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line. Ukrainian ground forces acknowledged that a Russian strike hit a military training ground in the Chernihiv region of northern Ukraine, but its casualty report differed widely from one issued by Moscow.

A Russian Defense Ministry video showed multiple small explosions apparently caused by a missile with a shrapnel warhead followed by one big blast, apparently from the other one armed with a high-explosive warhead. A similar Russian strike occurred last September, when two ballistic missiles blasted a Ukrainian military academy and nearby hospital, killing more than 50 people and wounding more than 200 others.