Here are the highlights of the 1,043rd day of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Here's what's happening on Thursday, January 2:
Fighting
- Russia launched the airstrikes on New Year's Day in the early hours of the morning Capital of Ukraine Kyiv which killed two people, injured at least six others and destroyed houses in two districts.
- Two rooms of an apartment building in the central district of Kyiv were partially damaged in the attack, according to the State Emergency Service.
- The President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said that when the New Year begins, all the people of Moscow will think that they are harming the country of Ukraine.
- Ukraine's military said it shot down 63 of 111 drones launched by Russia on Wednesday night, with 46 downed by electric shock.
- According to authorities, several buildings in the southern Ukrainian city of Zaporizhzhia went up in flames overnight following terrorist attacks and one woman was rescued.
- Ukrainian army chief Oleksandr Syrskii visited the Ukrainian army in the Russian border region of Kursk and said that the Russian army had lost more than 34,000 soldiers, either dead or wounded, in trying to drive the Ukrainian army out of region of Russia.
- In the past five months, about 700 Russian prisoners have been captured, which Ukraine can replace with its own people in Russian captivity, Syrskii said.
Wealth
- The journey of Russian gas through Ukraine to Europe has been suspended, Russian and Ukrainian officials have said.
- Russia's Gazprom said it did not have the legal or technical means to pump gas through Ukraine after Kyiv let the gas pipeline contract expire.
- President Zelenskyy said the decision stopping the flow of Russian gas through Ukraine was “one of Moscow's greatest conquests”.
- Ukraine's Minister of Energy, Herman Halushchenko, called the suspension of the trip “a serious incident” and that it was a decision taken “in the interests of national security”.
- Poland also hailed the end of Russian gas through Ukraine with Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski saying the cut was “a new victory after NATO's expansion in Finland and Sweden”.
Putin spent billions building the Nordstream to run through Ukraine and pollute Eastern Europe and threaten to cut off gas. Today Ukraine cut off its ability to export gas directly to the EU.
Another success after the enlargement of NATO is Finland and Sweden.– Radek Sikorski (@radeksikorski) January 1, 2025
- Russia's Gazprom has suspended gas to Slovakia following the termination of a contract to transport gas through Ukraine.
- Slovak gas supplier SPP said it was prepared for this and would supply all its customers via other routes, mainly through pipelines from Germany and Hungary, but would face additional transport costs.
- The Slovak government criticized Ukraine's decision, while Russian Prime Minister Robert Fico threatened to cut electricity from Slovakia to Ukraine.
- The gas cut was immediately felt in Moldova's breakaway region of Transdniestria, which was forced to cut heating and hot water supplies to households. A large part of the Russian-speaking population of about 450,000 people split into Moldova in the early 1990s when the Soviet Union collapsed and still has about 1,500 soldiers stationed there.
- Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered his government and the country's largest bank, Sberbank, to forge a partnership with China in manufacturing technology. Putin's instructions were published on the Kremlin's website, three weeks after he announced that Russia will join its BRICS partners and other countries to develop AI.