Russia shut down airports and temporarily cut mobile internet access for many users in Moscow on Tuesday, as it tightened security before the 9 May Victory Day parade marking the defeat of Nazi Germany. The parade, Russia's foremost national celebration, has been scaled back and will proceed without heavy military hardware for the first time in nearly two decades, amid fears of long-range Ukrainian drone strikes.
Ukraine has recently demonstrated its ability to penetrate Moscow's dense air defence systems: on Monday morning a drone struck a high-rise apartment building just a few miles from the Kremlin. In what appeared to be an effort to shield the military parade, Moscow earlier this month declared a unilateral ceasefire with Ukraine for 8-9 May and warned of a 'massive missile strike' on central Kyiv if it were violated.
Ukraine dismissed the proposal as a cynical ploy to protect the parade from drone attacks. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy responded by announcing a separate truce from 6 May, saying it was 'not serious' to expect Kyiv to observe a ceasefire tied to a Russian military holiday. His chief of staff, Kyrylo Budanov, later said that Ukraine's ceasefire proposal showed it was ready for a longer peace.
Security in the Russian capital has been visibly tightened in the run-up to the parade, with checkpoints set up across the city and snipers and machine-gun crews deployed on Kremlin towers. Residents on Tuesday awoke to dead mobile signals across Moscow, disrupting workers such as taxi drivers and delivery couriers. By midday, access appeared to have been largely restored, but more outages are expected in the coming days.
The Russian Orthodox church on Tuesday urged citizens not to worry about the widespread internet outages, suggesting they use the disruption to reflect on 'saving the soul' and acts of charity. All four of Moscow's airports suspended operations on Tuesday over unspecified security concerns. Alongside the heightened security presence on Moscow's streets, Russia has also stepped up personal protection for President Vladimir Putin in recent months, according to a European intelligence report.
