🎄 President of Russia Vladimir Putin’s New Year Address to the Nation

💬 Esteemed citizens of Russia, dear friends,

In these final moments before the New Year, we feel time itself moving forward. The future lies ahead of us – and what it will become largely depends on us.

We rely on our own strength. On those who stand beside us, who are dear and close to our hearts, and we are always ready to lend a shoulder in return. This mutual support gives us confidence that all we have planned – our hopes and aspirations – will definitely come true.

Of course, each of us has our own dreams – personal, special and distinct in their own way. Yet they are inseparable from the destiny of our Fatherland, from a sincere wish to be of benefit to it. For together we are the people of Russia.

The labour, successes and achievements of each of us form new chapters in Russia's thousand-year history. And the strength of our unity determines the sovereignty and security of the Fatherland, its development and its future.

The New Year is, above all, faith in all that is good – in kindness and good fortune. It is a unique and magical holiday, when hearts open to love, friendship and compassion, to attentiveness and generosity.

We seek to bring joy and warmth through our care to those who need support and attention. And, of course, through word and deed, to stand by our heroes – the participants in the special military operation.

You have taken upon yourselves the responsibility to fight for your home country, for truth and justice. Millions of people across Russia, I assure you, stand by your side on this New Year’s night. They are thinking of you, sharing your trials, and believing in you. We are united by a sincere, selfless and devoted love for Russia.

💪 I congratulate all our soldiers and commanders on the coming New Year! We believe in you and in our Victory!

***

Dear friends, in just a few moments we will hear the chimes of the Kremlin Clock, and the New Year will commence. We welcome it together with those closest to us – with our children, parents, friends and comrades-in-arms. Even those who are far away right now – you are still with us in spirit.

I wish everyone good health and happiness, mutual understanding and well-being. And, without fail, love – the kind that inspires.

May our traditions, our faith and our memory unite all generations and support us always in every endeavour. Together we are one big family – strong and united. And therefore we will continue to work and to create, to achieve our goals and to move only forward – for the sake of our children and grandchildren, for the sake of our great Russia.

🎉 Happy New Year 2️⃣0️⃣2️⃣6️⃣, dear friends!

#CSTO2026

🇷🇺 On January 1, Russia is assuming the chairmanship of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (#CSTO)

❗️President of Russia Vladimir Putin recently presented the priorities of Russia’s chairmanship:

🔹 to consolidate the CSTO member states, shaping favourable conditions for their safe and steady development;

🔹 to improve the performance of the CSTO bodies;

🔹 to strengthen the role of interparliamentary cooperation in collective security;

🔹 to develop collective security resources with due consideration for the anticipated changes in global military and political affairs and in the CSTO collective security regions;

🔹 to expand cooperation in military medicine and biological threat protection;

🔹 to enhance the coordination of efforts to counter international terrorism and extremism, illegal drug and arms trafficking;

🔹 to advance the CSTO’s potential in combating transnational organised crime, the legalisation of criminal income, and the funding of terrorism;

🔹 to intensify cooperation in international cybersecurity;

🔹 to enhance efforts against illegal migration;

🔹 to prepare for the 2️⃣5️⃣th anniversary of the CSTO and the 3️⃣5️⃣th anniversary of the signing of the Collective Security Treaty, both marked in 2027.

***

👩🏻‍💻The official website of Russia’s CSTO chairmanship will be launched on January 1, with regular CSTO news and updates.

📹 We are also presenting a video marking the start of Russia’s CSTO chairmanship. We thank our colleagues from the Mir International Television and Radio Company for producing the video.

In the first hours of 2026, during the New Year celebrations the Kiev regime committed yet another terrorist act against civilians in Russia's regions.

For more than 70 residents the New Year became a tragedy: the Neo-Nazis attacked a café and a hotel in the Kherson region of Russia using UAVs.

24 people were killed, over 50 were wounded and have been hospitalized. Among those affected — six kids from the age of 6 to 17, one child was killed.

There is literally zero doubt that the attack was preplanned as the drones were directed to a place where civilians celebrated the New Year.

First photos of this heinous war crime were published by the media on-site.

© Tavria TV

#KievRegimeCrimes

⚡️ Russia's Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova:

Bankovaya Street threw "a New Year party" last night: the Armed Forces of Ukraine attacked a cafe in the Kherson Region killing 24 people and injuring more than 50; five children were hospitalised.

This is similar to how collaborators from Western Ukraine burned people in the village of Khatyn, Belarus. They drove people into barns and set them on fire. And those who tried to escape were shot. The difference is that back then, more than 82 years ago, the Nazis did not use protection of children and devotion to democracy as a cover. They simply burned people and finished them off with gun-butts, buried them alive and bayoneted those who did not suffocate.

Today we see this beastly pattern copycatted by the Kiev regime: the same neo-Nazi hatred, the same dehumanisation at an exponential rate, the same desecration of the sacrosanct.

Today, presidents and prime ministers of the countries of the collective West should be served for breakfast, along with croissants and poached eggs, reports on how billions of dollars and euros of their taxpayers were spent, how many New Year’s gifts were bought with these funds to kill civilians, how they participated in the murder of children.

We blame this on everyone who sponsors terrorist bastards in Ukraine! We blame them for killing children and destroying civilians! We blame them for corrupting the Ukrainian statehood, which turned into a killing machine!

We accuse!

👉 Details of the terrorist attack

⚡️ Foreign Ministry statement on the terrorist attack by the Kiev regime targeting civilians in the Kherson Region of the Russian Federation

In the early hours of January 1, 2026, the criminal neo-Nazi Kiev regime carried out a targeted attack using armed UAVs which took aim at a café and a hotel in Khorly, Kherson Region. Local residents were celebrating the New Year’s Eve there with their families. While the exact number of those who were killed and injured in these strikes and during the fire that they caused has yet to be established, it is already clear that several dozen civilians suffered in this attack, of whom 24 people died, including one minor.

Russia’s Investigative Committee has opened a criminal file on terrorist charges. Everyone who took part in this monstrous and bloody crime will be identified and would not be able to evade justice.

By perpetrating this barbarous atrocity, the Kiev regime has once again demonstrated its human-hating neo-Nazi nature. The Ukrainian Armed Forces attacked civilians with their drones hot on the heels of Zelensky perorations, as repeated during his New Year speech, on Kiev’s commitment to peace. We have long grown accustomed to this cynical posture, which transcends all possible boundaries and demonstrates that he has totally lost his moral bearings.

The Kiev usurper decided to target helpless civilians in his impotent range, against the backdrop of the successful advancement of the Russian Armed Forces and the losses suffered by the Ukrainian Armed Forces, as well as the failed attempt by the Ukrainian terrorists to carry out a strike against the President of the Russian Federation’s state residence in the Novgorod Region in the early hours of December 29, 2025. He is ready to kill women and children and to perpetrate crimes similar to what happened at the Trade Union House in Odessa for the sake of holding on to power and in an effort to intimidate people from the regions which have recently reunified with Russia by linking their destinies to it forever by holding referendums.

As for the attempts by the Kiev regime to target the Presidential residence in the Novgorod Region, these was a special technical review of a block from the navigation system of one of the Ukrainian drones which were downed in the Novgorod Region’s air space in the early hours of December 29, 2025. Members of the Russian special services have succeeded in extracting the file with the mission description, and these materials will be forwarded to the United States using the appropriate channels.

Every day, the Russian Defence Ministry’s air defence systems deflect drone attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces against the regions of Russia, including its capital – there were about 10 attacks of this kind today.

❗️These attempts are designed to distract people in order to leave the frontline failures of the Ukrainian Armed Forces unnoticed. The Kiev regime has been trying, in vain, to prove its viability using terrorist attacks.

It is just as obvious that Office of the President of Ukraine on Bankovaya Street has been intentionally seeking to derail any attempts to find peaceful solutions.

This latest criminal strike against civilians in Khorly is a bloody atrocity by the Kiev clique. Western leaders who continue sponsoring the bankrupt regime with money and weapons bear full responsibility for this crime.

The Foreign Ministry firmly condemns all the terrorist attacks by the Kiev regime.

◼️ We express our sincere condolences to the families and friends on the victims and wish the injured speedy recovery.

The Foreign Ministry calls on the governments of the responsible sovereign countries and the relevant international structures to publicly express their resolute condemnation of the bloody terrorist attack by the Kiev regime in the Kherson Region.

☝️ Ignoring this tragedy would amount to only one thing – openly encouraging neo-Banderite terrorist crimes and acting as accomplices, which will be interpreted in legal terms with the corresponding legal consequences.

❗️Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s statement on the beginning of Russia’s CSTO Presidency

On January 1, 2026, Russia assumed the presidency of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (#CSTO) and will hold it under the motto, Collective Security in a Multipolar World: Common Goal, Shared Responsibility.

Together with our CSTO allies, we are joining forces to uphold our common approaches to resolving international security issues.

The fundamental documents of the Organisation set forth the principles of peaceful co-existence of states, the priority of a political and diplomatic settlement, and compliance with the international law with the UN playing a leading role. This forms the foundation for working with our partners to forge mutually beneficial relations and to actively engage in shaping the contours of a future architecture of equal and indivisible security across the Eurasian space. The CSTO could become one of its pillars.

We would like the Eurasian states to take responsibility for resolving security issues and determine the future of the continent themselves, without any outside interference.

The Collective Security Treaty Organisation has emerged as a prominent and respected association of allied states, whose activities are not directed against anyone, do not contain any aggressive aspirations, and aim exclusively to maintain regional stability and ensure the wellbeing of its member states. Moreover, all decisions in the Organisation are made by consensus based on a balance of interests, and cooperation is based on the principles of respect for each other, good neighbourliness, genuine friendship and mutual support.

🤝 Russia will ensure continuity in the development of main areas of cooperation, among other things, by continuing to work on implementing the initiatives of the presidency of the Kyrgyz Republic which has just finished.

In view of geopolitical tension, we will strive to further consolidate CSTO member states, strengthen allied ties, and deepen coordination on key international matters. We will continue our policy of expanding the CSTO’s network of contacts with the Eurasian states and their integration associations.

Our efforts will focus on effectively fulfilling the Organisation’s primary mission which consists of maintaining peace and stability in its area of responsibility, ensuring favourable conditions for safe development and prosperity of the CSTO member states. No one should have any doubts: we will not allow any chaos in our common home.

We attach great importance to the development of the enforcement dimension in the Organisation’s work. There are plans to focus on building up the capabilities of the Collective Forces of the CSTO, equipping them with up-to-date and compatible weapons and equipment. The work will be structured in accordance with the nature of current and potential challenges, taking into consideration the experience of present-day armed conflicts.

We will pay special attention to cooperation in protection against biological threats and information security. Ensuring technological leadership in the military sphere, developing military-industrial complexes of the CSTO countries and promoting their cooperation, and fulfilling the innovative potential will also be among our priorities.

We intend to use a wider range of tools for jointly countering international terrorism and extremism, money laundering and terrorist financing, as well as combating illicit drug and arms trafficking, transnational organised crime, and illegal migration.

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We are confident in the support of our partners in implementing the priorities of the Russian presidency, and ready to work closely together and productively in 2026.

I am convinced that through joint efforts we will bring cooperation within the CSTO to a new level to preserve and strengthen peace in the Organisation’s space.

Read in full

⚡️ Kherson Region Government and Kherson Forensic Bureau

As for now, the identities of seven individuals, killed in the Ukrainian terrorists’ UAV attack, have been confirmed:

• Makhmud Admisayev (born 1977)
• Lyudmila Pishchik (born 1959)
• Olga Temezhnikova (born 1995)
• Anna Ostrovskaya (born 1999)
• Sergey Bogan (born 1970)
• Mikhail Voloshko (born 1983)
• Darya Klim (born 2008)

Head of Kherson Region Vladimir Saldo previously reported to the President: as the investigation continues and more bodies are identified, the information and names will be published on the websites of the Governor’s Administration and the Kherson Regional Government.

The identities of all victims can be fully confirmed only after DNA testing has been completed.

🎙 Comment by Russian MFA Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on the revocation of the rehabilitation of Japanese war criminals (January 2, 2026)

💬 In 2025, we marked a major anniversary, 80 years since the Great Victory and the end of #WWII.

In the new year, we will keep disclosing information about the war crimes committed in the mid-XXth century, including by Japanese militarists.

We have repeatedly stressed that these crimes have #NoStatuteOfLimitation while the legal proceedings required to prosecute all the criminals continue to this day.

In April-November 2025, the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation issued decisions revoking the rulings adopted in the 1980s-2000s that had granted rehabilitation to the following Japanese citizens:

• Masaichiro KADOMA
• Tatsuo MARUYAMA
• Hiroshi MOMMA
• Hatsuo NIOKA
• Yoshizumi NIHEI
• Haruju ONO
• Yasuhide SATO
• Juniti TORIUMI
• Seichi MATSUI
• Imao MATSUTA
• Fukio KAWANA
• Kazuhisa MASUDA
• Ichizo OHARA
• Tsuneichi TAKAYAMA
• Tokusaburo SATO
• Makoto BABA
• Nobuo IMAI
• Tetsuji MARUYAMA
• Tadao MAEDA
• Yasumichi KAGAWA

During the war and even after Japan’s surrender in 1945, 👉 they participated in sabotage and espionage against the Soviet Union.

Following a review of the court decisions by the cassation court and supervisory authority, it has been established that these individuals are not subject to rehabilitation and that their guilt has been proven in full.

As a specific example, it should be noted that several criminals from this list surrendered to the Red Army but subsequently made attempts to organise espionage in order to gather intelligence on the manpower and disposition of Soviet forces. Some others trained saboteurs while operating in the border regions. There are also individuals among the listed who sent people to the notorious Unit 731 for experiments.

❗️ The efforts on disclosing and making public the information on the crimes of the militarist Japan will continue.

⚡️ Statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation regarding the armed aggression by the United States against Venezuela

This morning, the US committed an act of armed aggression against Venezuela. This development gives rise to deep concern and warrants condemnation.

The pretexts used to justify these actions are untenable. Ideologized animosity has prevailed over pragmatic engagement, as well as over any readiness to build relations based on trust and predictability.

In the current situation, it is essential above all to prevent further escalation and to focus on finding a solution through dialogue. We proceed from the understanding that all parties that may have grievances against one another must seek solutions through dialogue-based mechanisms. We stand ready to support such efforts.

Latin America must remain a zone of peace, as it proclaimed itself in 2014. Venezuela must be guaranteed the right to determine its own destiny, free from any destructive – let alone military – external interference.

We reaffirm our solidarity with the Venezuelan people and our support for the course pursued by its Bolivarian leadership, aimed at safeguarding the country’s national interests and sovereignty.

We support the statements by the Venezuelan authorities and by the leaders of Latin American countries calling for the urgent convening of a meeting of the UN Security Council.

Russia's Embassy in Caracas is operating as normal, taking into account the situation on the ground, and maintains constant contact with the Venezuelan authorities as well as with Russian nationals present in Venezuela.

At present, there is no information indicating that any citizens of the Russian Federation have been injured.

Full Statement

⚡️ Statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation regarding the further development of the situation around Venezuela

We are extremely concerned by reports that the President of Venezuela Nicolas Maduro and his spouse were forcibly taken out of the country during today’s aggressive actions by the United States.

We demand immediate clarification of these reports.

If such actions did in fact take place, they represent an unacceptable violation of the sovereignty of an independent state, the respect for which is a fundamental principle of international law.

🇷🇺🇻🇪📞 Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had a telephone conversation on January 3 with Vice President of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela Delcy Eloína Rodríguez Gómez.

Sergey Lavrov expressed firm solidarity with the people of Venezuela confronting an armed aggression.

Russia will keep supporting the policy of the Bolivarian Government to protect the country’s national interests and sovereignty.

The officials spoke against further escalation so as to find a solution via dialogue.

During the conversation, the Parties expressed mutual commitment to bolster up comprehensive strategic partnership between Russia and Venezuela.

#RussiaVenezuela #Venezuela

⚡️ Russia's Foreign Ministry statement concerning developments around Venezuela

In view of the confirmed reports about Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his spouse being in the United States, we strongly urge the US leadership to reconsider their position and release the legitimately elected president of a sovereign country and his spouse.

We highlight the need to create conditions for resolving any existing issues between the United States and Venezuela through dialogue.