Live updates | Ukraine training on 155mm howitzers begins

A senior U.S. defense official says training of Ukrainian personnel on American 155mm howitzers has begun in a European country outside of Ukraine, kicking off an effort to enable the Ukrainian army to use newly supplied U.S. artillery in the escalating battle for the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal U.S. assessments of the war, said the first of 18 promised U.S. 155mm howitzers arrived on cargo flights to Europe on Wednesday and more are on the way.

The artillery systems are to be moved overland directly into Ukraine; the training of Ukrainian personnel is being done on other 155mm howitzers elsewhere in Europe, the official said.

The senior U.S. defense official also said that Russia in the past 24 hours has added another four battalion tactical groups in Ukraine, all but one in the Donbas region.

The official did not say how many of the groups are now in the Donbas, but on Tuesday the Pentagon said Russia had a total of 78 such groups in eastern and southern Ukraine.

--AP Military Writer Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report.

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KEY DEVELOPMENTS IN THE RUSSIA-UKRAINE WAR:

— Russia hits Ukrainian cities, pours more troops into war

— More than 5 million people have fled Ukraine, the UN says

— Japan formally revokes Russia’s ‘most favored nation’ status

— Russia’s Chernobyl seizure seen as nuclear risk ‘nightmare’

— China looks to learn from Russian failures in Ukraine

Follow all AP stories on Russia's war on Ukraine at https://apnews.com/hub/russia-ukraine

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