Russia and Ukraine have accused one another of violating a three-day ceasefire as Moscow marked Victory Day by welcoming allies to a grand military parade.Russia’s President Vladimir Putin marked the 80th anniversary of victory over Nazi Germany on Friday alongside China’s Xi Jinping, in an event clearly intended to bolster support for his three-year offensive against Ukraine, which he had unilaterally paused for 72 hours to mark the occasion.
“Russia has been and will remain an indestructible barrier against Nazism, Russophobia and anti-Semitism,” said Putin, seeking to draw parallels between World War II – or the Great Patriotic War as it is named in Russia and other parts of the former Soviet Union – and the Ukraine war.
Russia maintains that its February 2022 invasion of its neighbour is a battle against a “Nazi” regime in Kyiv. Ukraine has dismissed that claim as “incomprehensible”.
More than 20 foreign dignitaries, including Xi and Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, watched the 11,000-strong parade on Red Square. Advertisement
The show of force was billed by Moscow as proof that the country has not been isolated by the war.
Russian servicemen take part in the Victory Day military parade in Moscow, Russia, on May 9, 2025 [Maxim Bogovid/RIA Novosti via AP Photo]
Throughout his quarter-century in power, Putin has tapped into the nation’s trauma over Soviet losses during the Great Patriotic War, which Russia dates as running from 1941-45.
With the two-year period of 1939-41, during which the Soviets maintained a non-aggression pact, with the Nazis sidelined, Victory Day has been elevated to become the country’s most important public holiday and a prime lever used to whip up patriotism.
Putin appeared to seek to transfer that mood to his w …
