Kyiv starts an open-ended ‘hard lockdown today, with mass transit restricted to ‘critical workers’ with special passes.

The lockdown – the third in one year – comes as the city registers 1,000 new infections a day. At the end of last week, Ukraine was registering a record 20,000 new infections daily and 5,000 new hospitalizations. Iryna Ozymok, of Western NIS, wrote Thursday in an Atlantic Council blog: “With little sign of any vaccine breakthroughs on the horizon, Ukraine looks set for many more months of coronavirus lockdown restrictions.”