On May 9, the “Immortal Regiment” procession will take place on Red Square - a civil initiative to perpetuate the feat of soldiers of the Great Patriotic War, preserve the memory of the valor and heroism of the people, as well as to patriotic education of current and future generations.
Participation in the action implies that every citizen, honoring the memory of his relative-veteran, goes to the Victory Parade with his photograph, taking a place in the column of the “Immortal Regiment”.
To join the procession of the Immortal Regiment, you just need to come with a portrait of your relative - a participant in the Great Patriotic War, who contributed to the victory over fascism, both at the front and in the rear.
Driving route
From the Dynamo metro station along Leningradsky Prospekt, Tverskaya Street, Tverskaya-Yamskaya Street, through Okhotny Ryad, Manezhnaya and Red Square. Next, the procession column is distributed along the Moskvoretskaya embankment and the Bolshoi Moskvoretsky Bridge.
The history of the event began in 2007 in Tyumen and was called the “Parade of Winners”. It began to be called the “Immortal Regiment” since the 2012 march in Tomsk, and already in 2013 it spread to 120 cities. In 2014, residents of 500 cities in seven countries took to the streets with portraits of front-line soldiers. Since 2015, the action has officially become nationwide.
Ecuadorian authorities have denied Julian Assange asylum at the London embassy. The founder of WikiLeaks was detained by British police, and this has already been called the biggest betrayal in the history of Ecuador. Why are they taking revenge on Assange and what awaits him?
Australian programmer and journalist Julian Assange became widely known after the website WikiLeaks, which he founded, published secret documents from the US State Department in 2010, as well as materials related to military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
But it was quite difficult to find out who the police, supporting by the arms, were leading out of the building. Assange had grown a beard and looked nothing like the energetic man he had previously appeared in photographs.
According to Ecuadorian President Lenin Moreno, Assange was denied asylum due to his repeated violations of international conventions.
He is expected to remain in custody at a central London police station until he appears at Westminster Magistrates' Court.
Why is the President of Ecuador accused of treason?
Former Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa called the current government's decision the biggest betrayal in the country's history. “What he (Moreno - editor’s note) did is a crime that humanity will never forget,” Correa said.
London, on the contrary, thanked Moreno. The British Foreign Office believes that justice has triumphed. The representative of the Russian diplomatic department, Maria Zakharova, has a different opinion. “The hand of “democracy” is squeezing the throat of freedom,” she noted. The Kremlin expressed hope that the rights of the arrested person will be respected.
Ecuador sheltered Assange because the former president had left-of-center views, criticized U.S. policies and welcomed WikiLeaks' release of secret documents about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even before the Internet activist needed asylum, he managed to personally meet Correa: he interviewed him for the Russia Today channel.
However, in 2017, the government in Ecuador changed, and the country set a course for rapprochement with the United States. The new president called Assange “a stone in his shoe” and immediately made it clear that his stay on the embassy premises would not be prolonged.
According to Correa, the moment of truth came at the end of June last year, when US Vice President Michael Pence arrived in Ecuador for a visit. Then everything was decided. “You have no doubt: Lenin is simply a hypocrite. He has already agreed with the Americans on the fate of Assange. And now he is trying to make us swallow the pill, saying that Ecuador is supposedly continuing the dialogue,” Correa said in an interview with the Russia Today channel.
How Assange made new enemies
The day before his arrest, WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Kristin Hrafnsson said that Assange was under total surveillance. “WikiLeaks uncovered a large-scale espionage operation against Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy,” he noted. According to him, cameras and voice recorders were placed around Assange, and the information received was transferred to the Donald Trump administration.
Hrafnsson clarified that Assange was going to be expelled from the embassy a week earlier. This did not happen only because WikiLeaks released this information. A high-ranking source told the portal about the plans of the Ecuadorian authorities, but the head of the Ecuadorian Foreign Ministry, Jose Valencia, denied the rumors.
Assange's expulsion was preceded by the corruption scandal surrounding Moreno. In February, WikiLeaks published a package of INA Papers, which traced the operations of the offshore company INA Investment, founded by the brother of the Ecuadorian leader. Quito said it was a conspiracy between Assange and Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and former Ecuadorian leader Rafael Correa to overthrow Moreno.
In early April, Moreno complained about Assange's behavior at Ecuador's London mission. “We must protect the life of Mr. Assange, but he has already crossed all boundaries in terms of violating the agreement that we came to with him,” the president said. “This does not mean that he cannot speak freely, but he cannot lie and hack.” ". At the same time, back in February last year it became known that Assange at the embassy was deprived of the opportunity to interact with the outside world, in particular, his Internet access was cut off.
Why Sweden stopped its prosecution of Assange
At the end of last year, Western media, citing sources, reported that Assange would be charged in the United States. This was never officially confirmed, but it was because of Washington’s position that Assange had to take refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy six years ago.
In May 2017, Sweden stopped investigating two rape cases in which the portal’s founder was accused. Assange demanded compensation from the country's government for legal costs in the amount of 900 thousand euros.
Earlier, in 2015, Swedish prosecutors also dropped three charges against him due to the expiration of the statute of limitations.
Where did the investigation into the rape case lead?
Assange arrived in Sweden in the summer of 2010, hoping to receive protection from American authorities. But he was investigated for rape. In November 2010, a warrant was issued for his arrest in Stockholm, and Assange was put on the international wanted list. He was detained in London, but was soon released on bail of 240 thousand pounds.
In February 2011, a British court decided to extradite Assange to Sweden, after which a number of successful appeals followed for the WikiLeaks founder.
British authorities placed him under house arrest before deciding whether to extradite him to Sweden. Breaking his promise to the authorities, Assange asked for asylum at the Ecuadorian embassy, which was granted to him. Since then, the UK has had its own claims against the WikiLeaks founder.
What awaits Assange now?
The man was re-arrested on a US extradition request for publishing classified documents, police said. At the same time, Deputy Head of the British Foreign Ministry Alan Duncan said that Assange would not be sent to the United States if he faced the death penalty there.
In the UK, Assange is likely to appear in court on the afternoon of April 11. This is stated on the WikiLeaks Twitter page. British authorities are likely to seek a maximum sentence of 12 months, the man's mother said, citing his lawyer.
At the same time, Swedish prosecutors are considering reopening the rape investigation. Attorney Elizabeth Massey Fritz, who represented the victim, will seek this.
The weather was not very good - it was drizzling, and even the air unit in the parade was canceled.
It’s good that we managed to admire it on the seventh in the bright sun and clear sky.
She headed, as usual, to Pushkinskaya.
I thought that the exit would already be closed, I’d get to Belorusskaya, walk to Pushkinskaya and go home.
And they still let us out, even though it was already two o’clock.
Here are the first march participants we met on Strastnoye
Passed through the frame 
People are walking along Tverskaya from Mayakovskaya - Belorusskaya - Dynamo.
While it’s free, we line up and walk down to Red Square.
For those who have arrived a long time ago and are already hungry - a field kitchen.
They also give out water.
The column is gradually becoming denser.
Footage of satellites in the procession
Young people
At house seven on Tverskaya we stopped to wait for the march along Red Square.
From time to time the column thundered Hurray! - starting from the bottom from Okhotny and going up, beyond Tverskaya-Yamskaya. It sounded amazingly powerful. It made me happy.
The loudspeakers broadcast songs from the war years, both very old and newer ones.
They sang along together, including young people.
The rain began to rain harder, even with the snow there was a short-term charge, literally a few minutes,
and then the sky began to clear.
At approximately 14:50, our part of the column began to move, and they walked without stopping.
The historical museum column flowed around two streams, I walked on the right
There are a lot of police 
And even more Victory volunteers
It's all together here 
Spectators 
The police are urging you on - Come on, come on, don’t linger!
Varvarka is blocked, we go to Kitay-Gorod by a roundabout route under the bridge and along the embankment.
It's impossible to get lost.
It should be mentioned that there were a large number of toilets installed under the bridge and further up to the metro, the queues were maximum two to three people long.
These are not May Day demonstrations in Leningrad, where the only one was waiting
those suffering at the Campus Martius.
:)
The nearest entrances - at Varvarka, which are overcrowded, I went to the one at Ilyinka.
On the way, two monuments clicked
It was interesting to take part in the march of the Immortal Regiment.
Exactly at 22 o'clock the first volleys of fireworks will sound. The brightest moment will come, literally, on May 9th. Looking into the evening sky, everyone will think about their own. But there is something that unites this day. With simple and warm thoughts, today almost eight million people across Russia took part in the “Immortal Regiment” procession. Two million more than last year. The action became truly nationwide. 850 thousand people came out in Moscow alone. This became important to all of us.
Especially from a bird's eye view you can see how this river of life and memory stretches through the center of Moscow. A real sea of people. And the day that united, connected all generations with the thread of Victory - both those killed in battle and the living; and those who had this happiness - to kiss their hands and hug them tightly, thanking for a peaceful life, and those who know their heroes only from stories and letters, from not always clear photographs, which they keep at home as the most valuable memory. They brought them out today for everyone to see - here he is, my hero!
Between the Dynamo metro station and the Belorussky Station Square, an hour before the start of the procession, there is a complete feeling of celebration. With us now are all those who decided to walk this entire path - almost six kilometers to Vasilyevsky Descent and always past the iconic place. After all, here, on the platform of the Belorussky Station, they said goodbye in 1941, seeing off to the front, and rejoiced, meeting those who survived and gave victory.
The faces are all one, simple and open. Eyes that know the price of life and such dear happiness - to live without war, without fear and tears. Their gift to us today cannot be appreciated in any way. All we can do is just walk with them in the same formation, clutching frames with cloudy photographs to the white knuckles and guessing as we go similar features in their great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren.
Some have no cards left with their heroes at all. And it was a difficult time - there was no time for photographs. And some simply did not survive the terrible years. But what is important is that the memory is alive. And many carry whole scatterings of photographs. Families went to war.
“This is my father, this is his uncle, they survived the war. And the older brother - he went missing. These are three brothers, all of them survived. And one lost his memory and lost his family,” say the march participants.
Looking at the portraits, you clearly understand: from the first day they all believed in Victory, in the fact that they would soon return home, but they would never forget their fighting friends. They believed, and therefore did not extinguish their living feelings for their closest and dearest, who knew how to wait like no one else.
An amazing story happened today almost live. Two sisters, who had never seen each other in 60 years, met during the “Immortal Regiment” - they recognized each other from identical photographs and told Channel One journalist Pavel Krasnov about their father.
“My granddaughter suddenly saw a portrait of our grandfather, my father. We approach, I say: you must be Lena! Daughter from his first wife. And this turned out to be our father. And so we met today,” says a participant in the action.
In the column of the “Immortal Regiment” today is Vladimir Putin with a portrait of his father, Vladimir Spiridonovich Putin. He went to the front in June 1941 and, while defending the Nevsky Piglet, a key bridgehead in breaking the Leningrad blockade, was seriously wounded by a grenade fragment. And today there is not a single soldier’s fate, much less a feat, that would not stir the soul.
How often after the war they tried to find each other. That pain ached, but front-line friendship was stronger than tank armor and gave no rest. “Where are you now, fellow soldiers?” - they whispered all their lives like a prayer. And it seems to be heard everywhere today: “We are all here!”
People are cheerful and friendly, sincere and cheerful. But it is impossible to fully describe the sensations from here, from inside the procession, in simple words. It's quite cool today, but the air itself seems to be heated with emotion. Here, on Pushkin Square, there are no longer hundreds of us, or even thousands, but tens of thousands - people with portraits are flocking from all the surrounding alleys. As they say, our regiment is arriving, and ahead is the heart of the capital.
For the first time in 75 years, in the hands of a great-great-grandson, a wooden accordion today began to sing “Katyusha” to the delight of the people.
“Our great-grandfather, he loved her, he never parted with her. Unfortunately, he died. And finally we convey these sounds, this joy to the rest of the people,” says a participant in the action.
Much of what keeps the warmth of the hands of the winners has been taken with them by their descendants today.
“This is my grandfather’s helmet. He was a tanker until he became a pilot. During the war it was very noisy, there were explosions, and that’s why it was specially made so that at least a little bit you couldn’t hear them, it was quiet,” says a participant in the procession.
Military marches on bagpipes are not at all exotic for good spirits. Another reminder that this was our common victory over fascism with the allied countries, from where dozens of descendants of World War II soldiers also came. Thomas Connolly - Scots Guardsman. He smashed the Nazis in France, Belgium and Germany. His son Gordon Connolly says he couldn't help but come out.
“This war united everyone and showed what a feat Russia accomplished for the whole world. My father told me that we owe it to you for the fact that we now live in the world - it was you who lost millions of people, more than all other countries,” he says.
“My father fought shoulder to shoulder with Soviet soldiers. He said they were great guys. He liberated Europe, and it’s very important to me that today he is at this grand celebration,” says John Paterson, the son of a World War II veteran.
For the first time, the grandson of Yuri Nikulin, his full namesake, along with his great-grandsons Stanislav and Sophia, are walking with a portrait of his famous grandfather in the “Immortal Regiment”. Senior Sergeant Nikulin was awarded the medals “For Courage” and “For the Defense of Leningrad.” It is not easy to recognize another legend of our cinema in this photo - at the front, Anatoly Papanov commanded an anti-aircraft artillery platoon, and in 1942 he was seriously wounded.
“For him, of course, Victory Day was the most important holiday of the year. He put on his orders and medals because he had them. When their platoon occupied some village, and the whole village was burned out, and the next morning they hear a rooster crowing! Dad says: we covered him with an overcoat, gave him some water, fed him something, and they had this rooster as a symbol of peaceful life,” says Elena Papanova, daughter of Anatoly Papanova.
“Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, my grandfather’s sister, and even today people come up and ask. This is the same Zoya who was in the partisan detachment, who was the first female hero of the Soviet Union. This is my duty, and it is very important for me that her feat is not forgotten. And so that people remember those who fought for them during the Great Patriotic War,” says German Kosmodemyansky, a descendant of Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya.
The most poignant stories in this ocean of people are, perhaps, the fates of the “children of the regiment,” boys who had to endure something that even many adults can barely endure.
“At the age of 13, he was left an orphan, his parents died, and he was picked up by troops passing by,” says a participant in the procession.
And how many more such front-line stories are told in a voice trembling with excitement, how many soldiers' destinies and views - a countless number. But each of us is here today only to bow and say to those who, under fire and in the rear, did not spare themselves: thank you, dear ones, for the Victory! Thank you for not sticking to the price!
“We are grateful to them for the Victory, for this peace that we now have. They had a dream to walk along Red Square during the parade. Thanks to this campaign, we can make their dream come true. I brought my dad here; he died in February 1942. And so I brought him so that he could feel that he had contributed to this victory. It is important for us to see our grandfather through, because he himself could not pass here. I would like that he, even in our arms, would pass here, today on this day. This is our family holiday, our family tradition. We want to pass this on to our great-grandchildren, my daughter. We remember how they celebrated this holiday when they were alive. We weren’t told much; this is a celebration with tears in our eyes. But it was clear from their faces what they had gone through,” say participants in the “Immortal Regiment” action.
Here, on Red Square, it seems that the people in the portraits even look at us especially warmly. These eyes, which have seen a lot of grief and horror, seem to ask us over time: don’t let this happen again! And they silently thank those to whom they gave life. For the fact that they remember, appreciate and understand how important it is for them, who have gone down in history forever, to be together here and now. Walk in this quiet formation. Rather, even float above our heads in the same place as the peaceful sky.
For more than three hours this endless stream of smiles and glances did not subside. This series of thoughtful and cheerful faces. The songs of those years, bitter and joyful stories did not stop. And the May evening was filled with a clear feeling that everyone did not carry a portrait of a hero, but led him, his dear one, through the whole of Moscow, tightly holding his hand.
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What's new was shown at the military parade on May 9 in MoscowVictory Day in 2017 turned out to be unusually cold. The temperature dropped to almost zero, and the sky was covered with low clouds.
“At the historical parade 72 years ago, the weather was exactly the same, it was gloomy and cold,” a correspondent for one of the federal channels rehearsed the text in front of a television camera.
At that moment, light snow began to fall from the sky.
Due to bad weather, the aviation part of the parade was canceled. During the pre-holiday days, the weather was sunny and warm, and during rehearsals a line of helicopters, fighters and heavy bombers gathered crowds of onlookers on the streets, but on May 9 the planes did not appear in the sky.
The night before it started snowing in Moscow. The Moscow authorities and the Ministry of Defense promised to disperse the clouds, but the bad weather turned out to be stronger.
Military aircraft can fly in any weather, but gathering in the skies near Moscow, forming a tight formation based on visual contact, would be too risky.
- The Immortal Regiment marched through the center of London
- Victory Day in Kyiv: a holiday with clashes in the streets
- The Russian Ministry of Defense spoke about an air parade that never happened
The parade under a cold gray sky without the final roar of aircraft engines overhead turned out to be unexpectedly short and crumpled, despite the abundance of tanks, self-propelled guns and intercontinental ballistic missiles inevitable at such a parade.
When the last Boomerang armored personnel carrier left the square, a military tractor drove out from the shadow of Lobnoye Mesto - it was hiding there in case some car stalled in the middle of the parade, as happened during the rehearsal in 2015.
This tractor completed the military parade instead of the bombers, hastily turning into the passage near the Spasskaya Tower.
Illustration copyright AFP Image caption The newest T-14 Armata tank at the parade on Red Square."Immortal Regiment"
The procession of the "Immortal Regiment", which began a few hours later, on the contrary, seemed bright and impressively large-scale. It was like this: this year, according to official data, about 750 thousand people took to the streets in Moscow with portraits of relatives who died during the war.
At the head of the column was Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Illustration copyright Reuters Image caption Victory Day in Moscow was celebrated with a military parade and a procession of the “Immortal Regiment”“Hundreds of beautiful and stern faces around, looking at you from black and white portraits. When I look at them, my throat always closes. Thank you,” writes Facebook user Oksana Mishchenko.
“I joined the ranks of the immortal regiment. It’s high time - after all, my grandfather reached Berlin. It’s a pity that we didn’t have time to meet. Thank you for this feat, it’s always in our hearts!” wrote Facebook user Yulia Chuvaeva.
For the second year in a row, the two main events on Victory Day in Moscow - the military parade and the procession of the Immortal Regiment - were separated in time and place (in 2015 they were part of one event on Red Square).
Illustration copyright EPA Image caption More than 700 thousand people reportedly took part in the Immortal Regiment march.For the second year in a row, it takes place a few hours after the noise of tank engines over the center finally subsides. This seems logical: the two main components of the holiday are completely different in essence.
The Immortal Regiment appeared in 2011 on the initiative of journalists from the independent Tomsk TV channel TV2, which was closed under pressure from local authorities.
Back in Soviet times, on Victory Day, war veterans gathered in the center of Moscow, met with fellow soldiers, and remembered their fallen friends.
This tradition, which also arose spontaneously, without instructions from above, existed for many years, as long as veterans could come to these meetings. However, over time they became fewer and fewer.
The idea of Tomsk journalists arose just when living human emotions and memories on that day became sorely lacking.
Illustration copyright Nikolsky Alexey Image caption For the third year in a row, the Immortal Regiment procession is led by Vladimir PutinUnder the direction of
The first procession took place in 2012 in Tomsk, and in a short time it became so famous that by 2015 it was already officially held in Moscow.
When this movement became really popular, the Russian authorities tried not only to help this action, but to lead it. In fact, for the third year in a row, President Vladimir Putin himself is in the forefront.
They began to prepare the “Immortal Regiment” in advance, organize it, and gather people for it; among homemade posters with portraits, more and more professionally made.
Illustration copyright TACC/Fadeichev Sergey Image caption The Russian authorities decided to take the “Immortal Regiment” action under their wingOn May 9, in the morning there were many people on the streets with stalls selling caps, and they began to let people into the procession through metal detectors. In 2017, meetings of the “Immortal Regiment” were held in schools at the initiative of administrations and even in Russian embassies abroad.
This was evident back in 2015, when many on social networks began to complain that the procession was attended by people who clearly did not know whose portraits they were carrying. “Quantitative indicators are not as important as the meaning of what is happening. And there was no need to mobilize anyone in advance. People would have been behind their backs anyway,” one of the authors of the idea, Sergei Lapenkov from Tomsk, said in an interview with the BBC.
On the one hand, it seems that the authorities are trying to organize and even initiate a movement, which in itself is much larger and larger-scale than that which can be assembled by administrative methods.
On the other hand, many fear that as a result, the sincere desire to remember dead relatives is thereby eroded and vulgarized, turning into something like a mass flash mob.
Illustration copyright TASS/Pochuev Mikhail Image caption People from different parts of the former USSR took part in the celebration of Victory Day in Moscow“Enthusiasm, sincerity, the real desire of people who remember the stories of their grandfathers or fathers about the war, who are proud that they have a photograph of their father, grandfather, mother, grandmother hanging on their wall, who want to come out and show that yes, ours also fought, also died when it all turns into an order from above, of course it degenerates. How long it will degenerate, fizzle out, we don’t know,” journalist Nikolai Svanidze told the BBC Russian Service.
Many others agree with him, who were confused by the state’s desire to participate in the action, which was born on the initiative “from below.”
However, so far there are no visible signs that this idea is running out of steam. Hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets of many cities with portraits of their dead relatives.