Volodymyr Zelenskyy has thanked Ukrainians fighting on the front lines in a New Year message as explosions rocked places across the country on the last day of the year.
People in Ukraine were urged to take shelter on New Year’s Eve amid what Ukrainian officials said was a Russian missile barrage.
One person has been killed and 20 injured in explosions in Kyiv, according to Mayor Vitali Klitschko.
In a video message on Telegram, President Zelenskiy vowed that Russia would lose and that the “terrorist state” would not be spared.
He added: “Thank you to everyone who protects Ukraine! Thank you to everyone who is now on the front lines!”
He also praised energy workers who have been repairing damage to Ukraine’s power grids after waves of Russian strikes.
Switching to Russian, he appeared to address ordinary citizens across the border, saying Vladimir Putin is “hiding behind the military” and “burning” his country’s future.
At least 10 explosions were reported in the capital Kyiv alone, and Mr. Klitschko said at least one person had died and 20 were injured.
He said through his Telegram account: “The buildings of two schools in the Solomyansk district of the capital, one in Pechersk, suffered varying degrees of damage. There is a kindergarten in the Solomyan district. There is no victims in these facilities.
“As a result of the Russian attack on civilian objects in the capital, one person died, 20 were injured. 14 victims were hospitalized, six were treated by doctors on the spot.”
More explosions were heard in the capital and surrounding region after Russia’s first wave of missile strikes, Reuters reported.
The reports come after a series of Russian missile attacks in recent days, with the heaviest airstrikes of the war so far on Thursday, according to Ukrainian officials.
A presidential aide in the capital said a hotel was among the buildings damaged by the dam.
The governor of the region surrounding Kyiv had warned shortly before of a possible missile attack and that the region’s air defenses were facing targets.
Putin moves to justify the war to the Russians
The latest violence came as Vladimir Putin used a New Year’s broadcast to Russians to reiterate that his country was fighting in Ukraine to protect its “motherland” and to secure “true independence” for its people.
Image: “The West lied about peace,” claimed Vladimir Putin in his New Year’s message
In a nine-minute message – the longest New Year’s address of his government in two decades – the Russian president accused the West of lying and provoking Moscow to launch what he called a “special military operation” in Ukraine.
“For years, Western elites hypocritically assured us of their peaceful intentions,” he said.
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“In fact, in every possible way they were encouraging the neo-Nazis who carried out open terrorism against civilians in the Donbas.”
He added: “The West lied about peace. It was preparing for aggression … and now they are cynically using Ukraine and its people to weaken and divide Russia.
“We have never allowed and will never allow anyone to do this to us,” Putin was quoted as saying by state news agencies.
The West and Ukraine have rejected Moscow’s claims related to the start of the conflict and say Putin launched a baseless war of aggression in an attempt to seize territory and oust Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.