Kiribati became the first inhabited country to enter 2000 during the Millennium celebrations.
The reason was its position near the International Date Line and the arrangement of its time zones. Kiribati moved the date line eastward around the Line Islands in 1994, placing the country's eastern islands on the same calendar day as its western islands. Kiritimati, also known as Christmas Island, then became famous for being among the first inhabited places to welcome a new day and the year 2000.
The phrase “first to enter the new millennium” can be debated because the exact start of a millennium depends on whether counting begins with year 1 or year 0. In popular celebration coverage, however, the 2000 transition was widely called the millennium.
Kiribati is an island country in the central Pacific, not to be confused with Christmas Island, an Australian territory in the Indian Ocean.