The Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, has been on for over a year as of this week.
Putin says the “special military operation” was aimed at “demilitarisation” and “denazification” of the country to protect ethnic Russians.
Ukraine says it was an illegal act of aggression against a democratically elected government and a Jewish president whose relatives were killed in the Holocaust.
Russian troops initially advanced further into the country, but on vigorous defences from Ukraine, Russian troops were forced to retreat in the east and south.
By the end of 2022, artillery fights across frozen fields and communities, drone assaults, and trench warfare had transformed the front lines into a battlefield.
There are many different estimates, but the majority place the overall number of civilian deaths and injuries between 10,000 and 30,000.
At least 2,50,000 troops from both sides have been killed or wounded in the war.
In Mariupol, at least 20,000 civilians were killed in the city and more than 90 percent of the city's structures had been damaged or destroyed during the siege.
Ukraine uncovered mass graves, bodies with signs of torture, and other evidence of war crimes, in a brazen violation of the Geneva Conventions.
The war resulted in a humanitarian crisis, as thousands of Ukrainians were internally displaced or fled abroad.
Neighboring Poland recorded the highest number of border crossings from Ukraine, at over nine million.
For a year, the Ukrainian military has faced down a much larger force, rolling back in Kharkiv and Kherson and holding the line in the hotly contested Donbas region.
While Western nations continue to provide Ukraine with assisstance, Russia continues to send missiles into every region of the country.
A year since Russian powers moved into Ukraine, there are no genuine indications of an exit from the battle.
Neither one of the sides seems prepared for a through and through military triumph, and negotitations seem just as unlikely.