Russia commemorates this Friday 80e Anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany in the Second World War, with a military parade attended by Chinese president Xi Jinping. Moscow fears that Ukraine will try to disrupt the event, after three years of a devastating conflict.
President Vladimir Putin, the longest Kremlin chief in post since Joseph Staline, will speak during a parade scheduled at 07:00 GMT. Thousands of Russian soldiers will traditionally parade there, accompanied by military materials such as intercontinental ballistic missiles and tanks, passing the Lenin mausoleum on the Red Square.
But the war in Ukraine, the deadliest in Europe since the Second World War, hovers on this celebration. Ukraine attacked Moscow using drones for several days this week, and Moscow as Kyiv accuse each other of having violated a 72-hour ceasefire declared by Putin.
The Kremlin claims that the presence of Russian allies such as Xi, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula Da Silva, as well as dozens of leaders from the former Soviet Union, Africa, Asia and Latin America, proves that Russia is not isolated on the international scene, even if the ancient Western allies of the Second World War prefer to stay away. On the European side, the leaders of Serbia and Slovakia will be present.
“Victory over fascism, obtained at the cost of immense sacrifices, has an eternal meaning,” Putin told Xi to the Kremlin. “The countless sacrifices made by our two peoples should never be forgotten. »»
The Soviet Union lost 27 million people during the Second World War, including several million in Ukraine, but it pushed the Nazi forces to Berlin, where Adolf Hitler committed suicide and where the Soviet Victory flag was hoisted on the Reichstag in 1945.
For the Russians – and for many peoples of the former Soviet Union – May 9 is the most sacred date on the calendar. Putin, irritated by what he considers Western attempts to minimize Soviet victory, sought to use the memory of the Second World War to unite Russian society.
Historians of the Chinese Communist Party believe that the losses of China during the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945) amount to 35 million people. The Japanese occupation led to the displacement of nearly 100 million Chinese and caused significant economic difficulties, as well as the Nankin massacre in 1937, during which between 100,000 and 300,000 victims were killed.
-Moscow and Kyiv do not publish specific figures on human losses in the war in Ukraine, but US President Donald Trump, who says he wants peace, argues that hundreds of thousands of soldiers from both camps were killed or injured.
The Moscow Parade
Putin sought to preserve Moscow from the artillery and drone war which rages 600 km (370 miles) from there, in Ukraine, although attacks by Ukrainian drones recently disturbed air traffic to the Russian capital.
The Kremlin claims that the army does everything possible to ensure the security of the parade, which takes place near the Kremlin and which, according to Russia, had been targeted in 2023 by Ukrainian drones.
Security is extremely enhanced in Moscow. Putin had proposed a 72-hour ceasefire covering May 8, 9 and 10, but Ukraine accuses Russia of having violated it, an affirmation qualified as absurd by Moscow.
The Kremlin indicates that military units of 13 countries, including China, will participate in the parade alongside the Russian troops, although we do not know how North Korea – which helped Russia in the war in Ukraine – will be represented.
In Kyiv, the Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky called on his allies to help him resist Russia, which now controls approximately one fifth of Ukrainian territory.
“Evil cannot be appeased. He must be fought, “said Zelensky, according to the Kyiv Post. He criticized the Moscow victory parade: “It will be a parade of cynicism. There is no other way to describe it. A parade of gall and lies. »»
