Kiribati is among the first countries to welcome the New Year because of Kiritimati's time zone.
Kiritimati, also called Christmas Island, is part of the Republic of Kiribati and lies in the Line Islands. The islands use UTC+14, the world's furthest-forward civil time zone, so midnight arrives there before it does in most other inhabited places. This makes Kiribati a frequent answer to questions about the first country to enter a new calendar year.
The timing is connected to the International Date Line, whose course is not perfectly straight and can be changed by national decisions. Kiribati moved the date-line arrangement for its eastern islands in 1995 so the country would share the same calendar date. “First country” can be imprecise because islands and territories enter the year at different times; Kiritimati is the geographic detail that makes the claim meaningful.