Home › Opinion › What January 2025 strikes said about the war
What January 2025 strikes said about the war
Summary
A look back at 22 January 2025 and the reports of drone raids, missile strikes and a new UK–Ukraine accord in the days before it.
What did the war look like on 22 January 2025? The reports from the preceding days show a conflict pressing on at several levels at once: strikes on Ukrainian cities, Ukrainian drone attacks inside Russia, and diplomacy with a close partner.
Strikes on Ukrainian cities
On 18 January 2025, at least four people were killed in Russian missile and drone attacks on Kyiv. The same day, a Russian ballistic missile strike on Kryvyi Rih killed four people and injured 14 others, according to the Governor of Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, Serhiy Lysak. Both reports came only days before 22 January.
Ukrainian attacks inside Russia
On 20 January 2025, Ukrainian drones attacked industrial facilities in Tatarstan, Russia. The Russian Federal Air Transport Agency temporarily suspended flights at Kazan International Airport in Kazan and Begishevo Airport in Nizhnekamsk. The reports describe the attacks and the flight suspensions, and nothing more.
A partnership put on paper
On 16 January 2025, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer visited Kyiv to sign a 100-year agreement with Ukraine. It was intended to formalise British economic and military support for Ukraine. The visit came in the same week as the deadly attacks on Kyiv and Kryvyi Rih.
What the sequence shows
Taken together, the reports from 16 to 20 January 2025 show three parallel tracks. Russia struck urban areas in Ukraine with missiles and drones. Ukraine reached industrial sites deep inside Russia, in Tatarstan. Ukraine and the United Kingdom set out a long-term framework for cooperation. On 22 January 2025, none of these tracks had been resolved, and each was still unfolding.
