{"id":121020,"date":"2025-01-01T15:09:36","date_gmt":"2025-01-01T15:09:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/ukraine-russia-war-latest-putin-launches-new-years-day-drone-attack-on-kyiv-with-pregnant-woman-among-injured-the-independent\/"},"modified":"2025-01-01T15:09:36","modified_gmt":"2025-01-01T15:09:36","slug":"ukraine-russia-war-latest-putin-launches-new-years-day-drone-attack-on-kyiv-with-pregnant-woman-among-injured-the-independent","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/ukraine-russia-war-latest-putin-launches-new-years-day-drone-attack-on-kyiv-with-pregnant-woman-among-injured-the-independent\/","title":{"rendered":"Ukraine-Russia war latest: Putin launches New Year\u2019s Day drone attack on Kyiv with pregnant woman among injured – The Independent"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Drone attack comes as third anniversary of the war approaches
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Russia has launched a major drone attack on Ukraine\u2019s capital Kyiv on New Year\u2019s Day.
More than 100 drones targeted the city in the early hours of Wednesday morning as the rest of the world was celebrating the arrival of 2025.
At least six people including a pregnant woman were among the injured, city officials said.
The attack comes amid concerns over the direction of the war, which is set to reach its third anniversary in February. <\/a>
In his New Year\u2019s message, Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky<\/a> said he had no doubt incoming US president Donald Trump<\/a> was capable of achieving peace.
The president-elect has boasted that he would be able to end the war \u201cwithin 24 hours\u201d of returning to office after his victory in the US elections in November.
Mr Zelensky thanked the current US administration for providing a wide array of critical military equipment, including 39 multiple-launch rocket systems, 301 Howitzer artillery weapons and over 300 million units of ammunition, as he recalled conversations with outgoing president Joe Biden<\/a> and \u201ceveryone who supports us in the United States\u201d.
Russian forces in 2024 advanced in Ukraine at the fastest rate since 2022, the war\u2019s first year, and control about a fifth of the country. But the gains have come at the cost of heavy, though undisclosed, losses in men and equipment.
In 2024, Russia was invaded for the first time since the Second World War as Ukraine grabbed a slice of its western Kursk region in a surprise counter-attack on 6 August.
Russia has yet to eject Ukrainian forces from Kursk despite bringing in more than 10,000 troops from its ally North Korea, according to Ukrainian, South Korean and US assessments. Russia has neither confirmed nor denied their presence.
\u201cTo sustain even the very slow advance in Ukraine, Russia has been forced to ignore the months-long occupation of part of its own territory by Ukrainian forces,\u201d British security expert Ruth Deyermond said.
\u201cTaking a \u2018nothing to see here\u2019 attitude to the loss of its own land is not what great powers do, particularly one so preoccupied with the idea of state sovereignty.\u201d
Deyermond, in a long thread posted on X, suggested Putin\u2019s efforts to portray Russia as a leading world power were also undermined by the toppling of its chief Middle East ally, former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, and its increasing dependence on China.
Mr Putin, the longest-serving ruler of Russia since Josef Stalin, said on 19 December that under his leadership the country had moved back from \u201cthe edge of the abyss\u201d and rebuffed threats to its sovereignty.
With hindsight, he said, he should not have waited until February 2022 before launching his \u201cspecial military operation\u201d in Ukraine, the term he still uses for the full-scale invasion of Russia\u2019s neighbour.
Vladimir Putin<\/a> made a three-word pledge to Russia<\/a>\u2019s soldiers<\/a> in his pre-recorded New Year address.
In his address to the nation on Tuesday (31 December), the Russian President praised his country\u2019s military<\/a> in its war against Ukraine<\/a>, telling soldiers, \u201cWe believe in you.\u201d
Putin ensured Russians that everything will be fine as the country enters the third year of fighting in Ukraine.
Read the full story here<\/em><\/strong><\/a>
Ukraine <\/a>has halted Russian <\/a>gas supplies to European customers that pass through the country, almost three years into Moscow\u2019s all-out invasion.
At a summit in Brussels last month, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy<\/a> vowed that Kyiv would not allow Russia<\/a> to use the transits to earn \u201cadditional billions … on our blood, on the lives of our citizens.\u201d But he briefly held open the possibility of the gas flows continuing if payments to Russia were withheld until the war ends<\/a>.
Ukraine\u2019s energy minister, Herman Halushchenko, confirmed on Wednesday morning that Kyiv had stopped the transit \u201cin the interest of national security.\u201d
\u201cThis is a historic event. Russia is losing markets and will incur financial losses. Europe has already decided to phase out Russian gas, and (this) aligns with what Ukraine has done today,\u201d Halushchenko said in an update on the Telegram messaging app.
Sam Rkaina reports:<\/em><\/strong>
Russia\u2019s Gazprom said that it \u201chas no technical and legal possibility\u201d of sending gas through Ukraine, due to Kyiv\u2019s refusal to extend the deal
By the time February 2025 arrives, marking three years since Vladimir Putin launched his full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the situation on the front line could look very different.
Currently, Russian forces are advancing in the east, slowly but surely, and they are shrinking Ukraine\u2019s partial hold of the border region of Kursk.
That the Russians haven\u2019t been more successful is a testament, above all else, to the resilience of Ukraine\u2019s troops on the ground, many of whom have been fighting continuously for years. Dysfunction in the Russian military, with Mr Putin as its de facto commander-in-chief, is another.
But US president Joe Biden has sent the final military package of his tenure to Ukraine, ending the support (for now) of Kyiv\u2019s most heavily-armed ally. US president-elect Donald Trump will soon re-enter the White House on the promise of ending the fighting altogether, even if that potentially means rewarding Mr Putin for his illegal land grab.
Tom Watling reports:<\/em><\/strong>
Russian forces are advancing in the east, slowly but surely, and they are shrinking Ukraine\u2019s partial hold of the border region of Kursk
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky has thanked the Ukrainian people and soldiers for their steadfastness in a New Year\u2019s address, as the war approaches its fourth year.
He wrote on X: \u201cToday, I address all those who value Ukraine, cherish their state, and lovingly call it \u2018Mine\u2019.
\u201cThose who cannot imagine themselves without Ukraine, no matter where they are. All those who have been fighting for it \u2013 so steadfastly and so bravely \u2013 for more than 1,000 days. This is you \u2013 our people. Ukrainians \u2013 men and women.
\u201cTo all of whom I am grateful to for this year, 2024. Our people who endure all difficulties with dignity. People for whom being citizens of Ukraine is a source of pride.
\u201cFor me, it is an honor to be the President of such people \u2013 Ukrainians who prove that no cruise missile can defeat a nation that has wings.\u201d
One person was killed in the drone attack on the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, city officials have said.
Two floors of a residential building were partially destroyed in the strike, before a woman\u2019s body was pulled from the debris, officials added.
Firefighters tackled a blaze caused by the drone strike on Wednesday morning, which also injured six other people.
Russia launched a drone strike on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv early on Wednesday, wounding at least six people and damaging buildings in two districts, city officials said.
Explosions boomed across the morning sky as Ukraine\u2019s air force warned of drones approaching the city and Mayor Vitali Klitschko said air defences were repelling an enemy attack.
Two floors of a residential building were partially destroyed in the strike, Klitschko said. Photos posted by the State Emergency Service showed firefighters dousing a gutted corner of a building and helping elderly victims.
Debris from downed drones also damaged a non-residential building in another neighbourhood, Klitschko added.
\u201cThis is yet another reminder to the world that Russian aggression knows no holidays or days off,\u201d Yulia Svyrydenko, Ukraine\u2019s first deputy prime minister, wrote on X shortly after the morning attack.
Kyiv\u2019s military said it had shot down 63 out of 111 drones launched by Russia overnight across various regions of Ukraine. Another 46 had been downed by electronic jamming, it added.
Russia has carried out regular air strikes on Ukrainian towns and cities far behind the front line of its nearly three-year-old invasion.
Russia<\/a> and Ukraine have exchanged prisoners of war in the latest such swap that saw the release of hundreds of captives and was brokered with the help of the United Arab Emirates, officials said.
Volodymyr Zelensky said 189 Ukrainian prisoners, including military personnel, border guards and national guards \u2014 along with two civilians \u2014 were freed. He thanked the UAE for helping negotiate the exchange.
Russia\u2019s defence ministry said that 150 Russian soldiers were freed from captivity as part of the exchange in which each side released 150 people.
The reason for the discrepancy in numbers wasn\u2019t immediately clear.
Russia and Ukraine have exchanged prisoners of war in the latest such swap that released hundreds of captives and was brokered with the help of the United Arab Emirates<\/p>\n

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