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New Year & Christmas

Russia’s main New Year tree arrives in Kremlin

This year, the tree arrived about an hour later than scheduled, due to traffic jams in the Russian capital

© Gavriil Grigorov/TASS

MOSCOW, December 17. /TASS/. Russia’s main new year tree arrived from the Moscow region’s Shchelkovo city district to the heart of Moscow, as a special truck transporting it entered the Spasskie gates of the Moscow Kremlin late on Thursday.

This year, the tree arrived about an hour later than scheduled, due to traffic jams in the Russian capital.

"We delivered the tree to its destination in the Kremlin. The journey was fine, we made several stops. We departed at about 2.00 p.m., accompanied by a convoy," the driver, dressed as Russian New Year gift-bringer Father Frost, told journalists.

The selection of candidates for Russia’s main New Year tree began in May and was completed in November. The winner, a 90-year-old tree, was selected among 37 contestants. It meets all the so-called ‘Kremlin standards’: the tree is between 90 and 100 years old, about 30 meters high, and has the right shape and the proper color.

The decorated tree will be unveiled to the public on December 22, and is expected to spend approximately three weeks in the Kremlin’s Sobornaya Square.

For the first time, a real fir tree was installed on Cathedral Square within the Kremlin’s walls in December 1996 at then Russian President Boris Yeltsin’s initiative. Due to severe frost in 2001-2005, which prevented the tree’s delivery, it was replaced with an artificial one.

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New Year & Christmas

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