Read everything about the war in Ukraine in this file.
In total, almost 100,000 people stood in front of the stadium in Moscow yesterday and 95,000 in the arena itself. That is roughly the same as the number of Russian soldiers who invaded Ukraine, Zelensky said. “Imagine 14,000 dead bodies in that stadium, plus tens of thousands of injured and maimed.” Those are the losses suffered by the Russians since the start of the invasion on February 24, according to the Ukrainian president. However, those figures cannot be independently verified.
Zelensky used the numbers to once again call for an end to the bloodshed. “The war must be ended. Ukraine’s proposals are on the table,” he was quoted as saying by the Ukrainian newspaper ‘Ukrajinska Pravda’. “I want everyone to hear me, especially in Moscow, the time has come to meet, to talk,” the president said in the video message.
Putin addressed a packed stadium yesterday to mark the eighth anniversary of the annexation of Crimea in 2014. The Russian president praised his troops in his first public appearance since the invasion, calling the war “a special operation”. “We haven’t had a unit like this in a long time,” Putin said.
Watch Putin’s speech in Moscow:
