Just before the turn of the year, Russia again attacked Ukraine with dozens of cruise missiles and missiles. According to the authorities, there were dead and injured. Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said an elderly man had been killed and eight people injured in the capital. A journalist from Japan was among the injured, Klitschko said.

At least ten explosions rocked Kyiv. The authorities had previously raised the air alarm and asked people to get to safety in shelters. The Ukrainian air defence is operational in the capital and the surrounding areas.

The deputy chief of the presidential office, Kyrylo Tymoshenko, published a photo and a video of a partially destroyed hotel in Kyiv, also used by journalists, in the Telegram news service. It was an attack by murderers and terrorists, he said. It makes the Russians happy at the holiday table to see a destroyed hotel in the heart of Kyiv. As a result of the impacts, the panes in the Palace of Culture “Palace Ukraine” were also destroyed, he said.

According to the authorities, several other regions were also attacked. Attacks were reported from the southern Mykolayiv region and the Khmelnytskyi region in the west. Two were injured in Mykolaiv and four in Khmelnytskyi in western Ukraine. Russia launched drone and missile attacks on Ukraine on Thursday.

Meanwhile, Russia and Ukraine have exchanged more than 200 prisoners of war. Russia handed over 140 people to Ukraine, Ukrainian chief of staff Andriy Yermak said. There are 132 men and eight women, some of whom were deployed in Mariupol or on Snake Island. The Russian Defense Ministry had previously announced that Ukraine had released 82 Russian soldiers.

In his New Year’s speech, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia was “morally” and “historically” on the right side of the conflict. Russia is also fighting in Ukraine to “protect our people in our historical territories, in the new territories of the Russian Federation,” he added, referring to the annexed Ukrainian territories.

Image by Wikimedia (President of Ukraine)/Attribution 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0)