The invitation to some European leaders to participate in the Moscow military celebrations on 9 May, the day of the victory in which Russia celebrates the defeat of Nazi Germany in the Second World War, is creating controversy in Brussels. Vladimir Putin has extended the invitations to the leaders of China, India and Brazil, as well as in Slovakia and Serbia, respectively a member country of the EU and a candidate country to enter it.
The warning of the EU
“Any participation in the parades or celebrations of 9 May in Moscow will not be taken lightly on the European side, considering that Russia is really leading a large -scale war in Europe,” he warned the high representative for EU foreign policy, Kaja Kallas, speaking to journalists in Luxembourg after a meeting of foreign ministers. The former premier Estonian added that the EU does not want no potential member of the blockage to join the Putin celebrations.
Kiev’s invitation for the Feast of Europe
May 9 is also the Feast of Europe, and the Ukrainian Foreign Minister, Andrii Sybiha, invited his EU colleagues to Lopoli for that day. “I think it is a great idea to demonstrate that Europe is in Ukraine and does not alongside Putin in Moscow,” said Radoslaw Sikorski, the Foreign Minister of Poland, a country that holds the presidency of the EU.
“I agree with Kaja Kallas: the presence of any representative of a member country or candidate in Moscow would be a misfortune for that country,” added Sikorski. Slovak Premier Robert Fico and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic confirmed that they had received the invitation from Putin, but they have not yet declared if they accept it. The Hungarian Viktor Orban, considered the European leader closest to Putin, has already said that he will not participate in the parade.
Fury of Russia
In response struggling of the high EU representative, the president of the State Duma of the Russian Federation, Vyacheslav Voladin, asked that Kallas is “removed from the assignment and placed under the United Nations International Court”. According to reports from the Russian press agency Tass, Volodin called Kallas “a Russiano”, and argued that his statements would be “a lack of respect for the memory of those who sacrificed themselves to save the world from fascism”.
The head of the Russian Assembly stressed, that “the world, saved from the contributions of the Soviets at a cost of 27 million lives, as well as the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition, which included the United States and England, who have lost more than 800 thousand people, should always remember and honor their memory”.
