Christmas Tree on Independence Square in Kyiv to Be Lit on December 17

Ukraine's main Christmas tree on Independence Square in Kyiv will be lit on December 17, the head of the main department of culture and arts at Kyiv City State Administration (KCSA) Svitlana Zorina has said.

The Christmas tree lighting ceremony will be attended by Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, Metropolitan Volodymyr of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Moscow Patriarchate, and KSCA head Oleksandr Popov, as well as other official government representatives.

This year the Christmas tree on Independence Square is 35 meters high, and 480 individual fir trees were used in its construction. Milka is the sponsor of the New Year holidays.

On December 19, St. Nicholas Day, Independence Square will host a festival during which St. Nicholas will pass his crosier to Popov. Participating in a festive concert will be over 130 children's creative teams, in particular, 20 collectives of the Ukrainian diaspora.

On December 31, Kyiv will for the first time host a New Year masked ball with the participation of professional actors, the Kyiv academic municipal brass band, an ensemble of drummers, and a stilt theater show. A light show will start on Bessarabska Square and reach Independence Square.

On January 7, a Christmas nativity scene will be held on Independence Square near Mykhailivska Street. It will bring together creative teams, in particular, a choir of seminarians from Lutsk.

On January 13, a festive show entitled "Recollections of the Old Year" will be held on Independence Square.

Some 10,000 LED garlands with a total length of 150 kilometers were purchased to decorate the city's central streets. The garlands contain 1.5 million energy-saving lamps and have a total weight of over 30 tonnes.

Deputy dead of Kyiv City State Administration Leonid Novohatko said that 1.5 million UAH would be allocated from the city budget to organize the New Year and Christmas holidays, which is 100,000 UAH more than in 2009.