The Russian president said on Saturday that the Russian army is facing “aggressive” forces supported by NATO in Ukraine, during a speech on Red Square to commemorate the victory against Nazi Germany.
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that his army was confronting forces in Ukraine “aggressive» supported by NATO, during a speech on Red Square for modest commemorations of May 9 on the first day of a truce accepted by kyiv. This parade, marked by the absence of military equipment and which lasted only 45 minutes, was reinforced at the last minute by the entry into force of a three-day truce announced the day before by Donald Trump.
Threats of Ukrainian drone attacks to disrupt the ceremonies marking the Soviet victory against Nazi Germany, celebrated on May 9 in Russia, and of Russian strikes in retaliation against the center of Kiev had loomed over the previous days.
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“Our cause is just”
«The great feat of the victorious generation (against Adolf Hitler, editor’s note) today inspires the soldiers who lead the special military operation (in Ukraine). They face an aggressive force armed and supported by the entire NATO bloc“The Kremlin guest said from the stands. «I firmly believe that our cause is just. We are together. The victory was ours and it will be forever“, he added, before the Russian anthem sounded.
The Russian leader spoke in front of several hundred soldiers standing in Moscow’s main square. Soldiers from the North Korean army, which helped Moscow drive out Ukrainian troops from the Kursk region in the spring of 2025, took part in the commemorations, according to Russian television.
Court défilé
This parade, which started at 10 a.m. local time (7 a.m. GMT) and ended at 10:45 a.m., took place under high security. Mobile internet does not work in the center of Moscow and the streets of the capital are almost all deserted. These commemorations are an important event allowing Vladimir Putin, in power for 26 years, to mobilize the memory of the Soviet victory and to rally the Russian population behind the military campaign in Ukraine. But this year they appeared threatened by incessant Ukrainian drone attacks on Russian territory.
After two attempted truces, Ukrainian then Russian, which were not respected this week, the American president announced Friday evening a three-day ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia starting on Saturday. HAS”Let’s hope this is the beginning of the end of a very long, bloody and difficult war“, wrote the American president on his Truth Social platform, specifying that the ceasefire would be accompanied by a “prisoner exchange of 1000 inmates from each country».
Just after the publication of Donald Trump’s message, the Ukrainian president agreed to the three-day ceasefire and ordered the army not to attack the planned parade on Red Square. Moscow also confirmed having accepted the truce and the exchange of prisoners. HAS”Red Square is less important to us than the lives of Ukrainian prisoners who can be repatriated“, declared the Ukrainian president.
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Pompe des célébrations réduite
Moscow reduced the pomp of the celebrations: for the first time in almost twenty years, there was no military equipment on Red Square, nor cadet corps and military schools. The number of foreign dignitaries has also decreased. Only the leaders of Belarus, Malaysia and Laos and Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico traveled to Moscow, in addition to those of the two separatist Georgian republics supported by Moscow and not recognized by the UN, according to the Kremlin.
Moscow had already declared a truce on May 8 and 9 for the commemorations, but both Ukraine and Russia continued their drone attacks after this unilateral announcement. Donald Trump assured that the outcome of the war was “closer and closer“, while discussions resumed this week between Ukrainian and American negotiators in Florida (southeast).
These talks had taken a back seat since the start of the war in the Middle East. On Friday, Volodymyr Zelensky said he hoped American negotiators would come to Ukraine in the coming weeks. The large-scale Russian offensive on Ukraine launched in 2022 and entering its fifth year has left hundreds of thousands dead. It is the bloodiest conflict in Europe since the Second World War.
