Press Release, 9.05.2024

On 9 May, the leaders and members of the Yabloko party honoured the memory of those killed in the Second World War at the Preobrazhenskoye cemetery in Moscow, where more than 10,000 soldiers and commanders of the Red Army are buried. The delegation laid flowers and a wreath at the War Memorial.

The solemn mourning ceremony was attended by Yabloko Chairman Nikolai Rybakov, Chairman of the Federal Political Committee Grigory Yavlinsky; members of the Federal Political Committee Alexei Arbatov, Ivan Bolshakov, Alexander Gnezdilov, and Sergei Mitrokhin; members of the Federal Bureau of the party Alexander Yefimov and Andrei Morev, Deputy Chairman of the Moscow Yabloko Kirill Goncharov and other members and activists of the party.

“Coming to such burials, you think not only about those terrible losses during the war, but also about the value of human life. How many lives the war has claimed, how many lives are being lost now… And every day we must think and talk with our loved ones about how to make sure that the killing of people stops. So that the words “never again” and “Peace to the World” will return to Earth again,” Nikolai Rybakov said.

“Today is the day of the great Victory, but it is also a day of memory and sorrow. In memory of the people who gave their lives for our future, for our country, so that our country be peaceful, so that the Russian people never face war again. We bow down before them, our deepest gratitude to them. We must never forget our responsibility to them,” Grigory Yavlinsky emphasised.

Also on 9 May, members of the Yabloko party honoured the memory of the fallen French pilots from Normandie-Niemen fighter squadron of the French Air Forces at the Vvedensky cemetery in Moscow, who heroically defended the skies of our country and died in battles on the Soviet-German front. The pilots were buried here during the Second World War, but in the 1950s their remains were transported to France, and the memorial was preserved as a sign of memory to the war heroes.

Earlier, on 4 May, the head of the party, Nikolai Rybakov, laid flowers at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in the Alexander Garden in Moscow, as well as at the steles of the hero cities: Leningrad, Kyiv, Odessa, Minsk, Sevastopol, Kerch, Novorossiysk, Tula, Smolensk, Murmansk, Stalingrad and the Brest fortress

On May 8, Nikolai Rybakov honoured the memory of those who fell in the Second World War at the Piskarevskoye Memorial Cemetery in St.Petersburg, the largest mass burial in the world. The ceremony was also attended by deputies of the Legislative Assembly of St. Petersburg Alexander Shishlov and Boris Vishnevsky, and other members of Yabloko.

Commemorative events with the participation of Yabloko members and supporters were also held in other regions of the country.