For the first time in post-war history, 28 cities will host military parades on the occasion of the Victory Day in the Second World War.

Russia's Defense Ministry has announced plans to hold military parades dedicated to World War II Victory Day in 28 Russian cities.

Military parades will take place in Moscow, St. Petersburg, Smolensk, Tula, Kaliningrad, Voronezh, Rostov-on-Don, Volgograd, Vladikavkaz, Caspian, Stavropol, Novocherkassk, Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk, Samara, Vladimir, Khabarovsk, Khabarovsk Ude, Murmansk, Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, North Sea, Novorossiysk and Ussuri, as well as Russian-annexed Ukrainian cities of Sevastopol, Kerch, Simferopol.

The main air parade will take place in Rostov-on-Don, near the border with Ukraine, against which Russia is currently fighting.

More than 30 fighter planes and helicopters will take part in the air parade.

Russia's war against Ukraine

  • At 5 am on February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the start of a military operation against Ukraine in the Donbas at the request of the DNR and LNR groups.

    On February 21, during a televised address to the Russians, Putin called the so-called "DPR" and "LPR" independent states within the regions.

    On February 22, the Federation Council ratified the decision.

  • All the days of the war are shelling Ukrainian cities with missiles, flying aircraft.

    Russian troops are attacking, including from the territory of Belarus, using airfields, bases and roads.

    Representatives of the Lukashenko regime justify the war, the opposition considers the territory of Belarus occupied and calls for resistance to Russian invaders.

  • On February 27, the International Legion of Territorial Defense was established in Ukraine, and foreign volunteers were encouraged to join.

    Belarusians also entered there.

    During the two months of the war, four Belarusian volunteers and soldiers of the Ukrainian Armed Forces were killed at the front: 31-year-old Alyaksei Skoblya, call sign "Tour", 27-year-old Ilya Litvin from the Belarusian Territorial Defense Company of the Azov Battalion, Dmitry Apanasovich (call sign "Terror"). and Dmitry Rubashevsky "Hans".

  • On March 30, the UN approved the composition of an independent commission to investigate Russian war crimes in Ukraine.

    It included people who worked in the conflict in Rwanda and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

  • Contrary to Putin's claims of attacks exclusively on military facilities, the Russians are bombing schools, kindergartens and residential areas of Ukrainian cities.

    The Russians are using banned weapons, including cluster bombs against civilians.

  • The number of refugees from Ukraine has exceeded 5 million people.

    Poland received the most refugees from Ukraine - almost 3 million, Romania - about 800 thousand.

    Russia is listed on the third line with more than half a million people, but in Ukraine, based on conversations with the population of the occupied cities, they claim that people are taken there by force, actually kidnapping and often separating families, taking children.

  • On April 1, Lithuania became the first EU country to completely abandon Russian gas.

    Latvia and Estonia followed suit.

    Germany has promised to completely suspend the use of Russian oil by the end of 2022.

  • On April 2, after the liberation of the city of Bucha near Kiev, photojournalists published dozens of photos showing hundreds of the dead, victims of massacres committed by Russian troops.

    Many are buried in natural mass graves.

    The Russian occupation and Borodyanka brought great destruction.

    A number of rapes, including infants, are also known.

  • In April, the Russians launched a large-scale attack on the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, conquering about 80% of their territory, according to the head of the Luhansk regional administration Sergei Gaidai.

    Fighting is also going on in the Kherson region.

  • Fighting continues in Mariupol, near the Azovstal plant, which holds the Ukrainian army.

    Russia seeks to establish full control over the city.

  • In early April, Ukraine and Western countries estimated Russia's losses in the war at 15-20 thousand killed.

    The Kremlin says the figure is ten times lower, although Putin's spokesman acknowledged that the losses were "significant".

    In March, Ukraine claimed 1,300 of its dead defenders.

    President Zelensky said that the ratio of losses of Ukraine and Russia in this war is "one to ten."

  • The surviving Russian units withdrew from Kyiv, Chernihiv and Sumy oblasts in early April after failing to capture any major cities there.

  • In April, missile attacks on Ukraine and air strikes from Belarus decreased, Russian troops left Belarus.

  • Since the beginning of the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine, 23 Ukrainian and foreign journalists have been killed.

  • In Mariupol, after the evacuation, about 200 civilians still remain on Azovstal.

    On May 3, Russia launched a new assault on the plant.

    The night before, two bombs were dropped, killing two women.

  • Independent verification of information about hostilities provided by officials of various parties is not yet possible.