Moscow threatens retaliatory strikes if Ukraine attacks Russia during Victory Day commemorations.<\/p>\n
Published On 6 May 20266 May 2026<\/p>\n
Russia\u2019s Ministry of Foreign Affairs says it has warned diplomatic missions to promptly evacuate their staff from the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, in case Moscow launches a mass strike on the city in response to potential Ukrainian attempts to disrupt Russia\u2019s May 9 Victory Day commemorations.<\/p>\n
In a video posted on Telegram on Wednesday, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova urged diplomats to heed the Defence Ministry\u2019s warning of a strike, issued on Monday, in the event of a Ukrainian attack during the commemorations of the Soviet Union\u2019s victory against Nazi Germany in World War II and a military parade in Red Square.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThe Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs strongly urges the authorities of your country, the leadership of your organisation, to treat this statement with the utmost responsibility and ensure the timely evacuation from the city of Kyiv of the personnel of diplomatic and other representations in connection with the inevitability of a retaliatory strike on Kyiv by Russia\u2019s Armed Forces,\u201d Zakharova said.<\/p>\n
Zakharova said that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy had made \u201caggressive and threatening statements\u201d about disrupting the commemorations at a meeting of the European Political Community in Armenia on Monday.<\/p>\n
\u201cSeveral EU countries were present,\u201d she said. \u201cNone of them reprimanded the ringleader of the Kyiv regime.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018This is telling\u2019<\/p>\n
In his remarks in Armenia, Zelenskyy noted a Russian announcement that the commemorations were being scaled down and taking place without military hardware for security reasons.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt will be the first time in many, many years they cannot afford military equipment, and they fear drones may buzz over Red Square. This is telling,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Zelenskyy said Russia was redeploying air defences from its regions to around Moscow in preparation for the May 9 military parade, adding that the move creates space for more Ukrainian long-range attacks.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis indicates that the Russian leadership is not preparing for the ceasefire that has been the subject of so many statements, and is more concerned about its parade in Moscow than about the rest of Russia,\u201d Zelenskyy posted on X.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt the same time, we observe that this creates additional opportunities for our long-range sanctions. We will define our corresponding priorities,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, both countries announced competing ceasefires<\/a> before the event. Both sides have accused each other of breaching the unilateral ceasefire<\/a> announced by Ukraine for May 6. Russia offered its own temporary truce for its Victory Day celebrations on May 9.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Moscow threatens retaliatory strikes if Ukraine attacks Russia during Victory Day commemorations. Published On 6 May 20266 May…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":942414,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7655],"tags":[299,12,332,7661,657],"class_list":{"0":"post-942413","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-russia","8":"tag-europe","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-russia","11":"tag-russia-ukraine-war","12":"tag-ukraine"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116529845155578622","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/942413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=942413"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/942413\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/942414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=942413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=942413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=942413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}