Ukrainian capital hit by Russian missiles on New Year’s Eve

Russia carried out its second major round of missile attacks on Ukraine in three days on Saturday, Ukrainian officials said, with explosions reported in the capital and throughout the country on New Year’s Eve.

Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said at least one person had been killed and eight wounded after a series of explosions in the capital. Reuters correspondents reported hearing 10 blasts in the city.

The mayor said one of those wounded was a Japanese journalist who had been taken to hospital. A hotel just south of Kyiv’s city centre was hit and a residential building in another district was damaged, according to the city administration.

The governor of the surrounding Kyiv region, Oleksiy Kuleba, had warned shortly beforehand of a possible incoming missile attack, and said air defences in the region were engaging targets.

“The terrorist country launched several waves of missiles. They are wishing us a happy New Year. But we will persevere,” Kuleba wrote on Telegram in a separate post after explosions shook the capital.

Other cities across Ukraine also came under fire. In the southern region of Mykolaiv, local governor Vitaliy Kim said on television that six people had been wounded.

In a separate post on Telegram, Kim said Russia had targeted civilians with the strikes, something Moscow has previously denied.

“According to today's tendencies, the occupiers are striking not just critical ... in many cities [they are targeting] simply residential areas, hotels, garages, roads.”

In the western city of Khmelnytskyi, two people were wounded in a drone attack, Ukrainian presidential aide Kyrylo Tymoshenko said.

Elsewhere, Russia and Ukraine freed more than 200 captured soldiers, the latest prisoner exchange between the two sides.

In Russia, President Vladimir Putin devoted his annual New Year’s address on Saturday to rallying the Russian people behind his troops fighting in Ukraine.

In a stern and combative recorded video message, broadcast on national television, Putin cast the war as a near-existential fight for the future of Russia.

Its soldiers, he said, were fighting for “our motherland, truth and justice ... so that Russia’s security can be guaranteed”.

For months, the Kremlin presented the conflict as a limited campaign that would not affect most Russians’ lives.

But the speech, delivered in front of grim-faced soldiers in combat uniform, put the war squarely centre-stage, telling families gathered for the year’s main celebration that the months ahead would require support and sacrifice from everyone.

The message was being broadcast into millions of homes on state TV just before the clocks struck midnight in each of Russia’s 11 time zones, as families tucked into a festive meal and exchanged gifts.

As the war drags into its 11th month with no end in sight, the Kremlin has slowly put society on more of a war footing, including calling up more than 300,000 reservists, retooling an economy hurt by a barrage of Western sanctions and saying publicly that the conflict may be a long one.

Reuters