by Our Foreign Desk

HUNDREDS of thousands of Russian civilians marched through central Moscow to Red Square at the weekend to commemorate the 70th anniversary of victory over Nazi Germany.

They carried portraits of relatives who fought in the war and were joined in Red Square by President Vladimir Putin who bore a photo of his naval veteran father.

The mass civilian commemoration followed the annual Victory Day military parade through Red Square, which featured new weaponry, including the highly sophisticated Armata tank.

At the head of the parade were the Russian flag and the legendary hammer-and-sickle banner that was hoisted over the Reichstag in Berlin in 1945 by a Red Army soldier to signify victory.

Also on view for the first time at the parade was an RS-4 Yars intercontinental ballistic missile-launcher, along with several new smaller vehicles.

Victory Day commemorates the Soviet Union’s huge suffering in the war, including 27 million dead, and highlights Russia’s self-image as a force for peace and security. This year’s parade was the biggest military parade since the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991.

“Wherever veterans of WWII live now, they must know that here in Russia we value greatly their courage, resolve and loyalty to frontline brotherhood,” said President Putin.

He told the assembled troops and veterans that the carnage of the war underlined the importance of international co-operation, but “in the past decades we have seen attempts to create a unipolar world.” Western political leaders boycotted the Moscow celebrations in protest at Russia’s backing for anti-fascist resistance forces in Ukraine.

However, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who has a greater historical appreciation of wartime reality than many of her peers, arrived in Moscow yesterday on a visit scheduled to include recognition of Red Army sacrifices.

Chinese President Xi Jinping was the most prominent world leader to attend the parade, and Mr Putin made note in his speech of China’s role in the war when it was occupied by Japan, saying that, like the Soviet Union, “it lost many, many millions of people.”

Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, India, Mongolia, Serbia and China all sent their soldiers to participate in the Moscow parade.