At least a dozen foreign volunteers serving in Ukraine’s military were killed in a Russian missile strike on a training camp in central Ukraine late last month, The New York Times reported Tuesday, citing Ukrainian soldiers familiar with the incident.
The victims of the July 21 attack near the city of Kropyvnytskyi reportedly included citizens of the United States, Colombia, Taiwan, Denmark and other countries.
According to The New York Times, the missile hit the base’s dining hall during lunchtime, when soldiers were inside.
An anonymous American recruit from Florida told the newspaper the blast was the loudest he had ever heard, adding that he saw at least 15 dead and more than 100 wounded.
The strike also set off a fire at a nearby ammunition depot, triggering more explosions even as survivors tried to tend to the wounded, the recruit said.
According to the soldier, the base’s air raid siren did not sound before the strike and there were no first-aid kits in the dining hall.
The Ukrainian military confirmed to The New York Times that soldiers had been killed and wounded in the attack but declined to provide further details.
Volodymyr Kaminsky, a spokesman for the International Legion of Ukraine’s military intelligence, the unit targeted in the attack, said an investigation was underway and that the official casualty figures could not be released until it was over.
Ukraine’s Air Force had confirmed a missile attack on Kropyvnytskyi on the day of the strike, and the head of the regional administration said emergency services had been dispatched.
In 2022, troops were killed in an attack on a training center in Yavoriv, and in 2024, a missile strike in Poltava killed more than 50 cadets and soldiers.
Ukraine’s commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrskyi said in a statement that troops “must respond to air raid alerts and enemy drones immediately” and that the military would move training to sheltered underground sites “as much as possible.”
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