Immortal Regiment marches across Russia as families honour war heroes

Today across Russia official parades were held to honour the tens of millions of Soviet troops and civilians killed in defeating the scourge of Nazism.

These 9 May events are the most solemn of all annual commemorations in the country. 

The largest as usual was in Red Square, Moscow but other events were held in each region.

But our pictures here show a newer annual commemoration of the Immortal Regiment by which families march to honour their own relatives who served in the war. 

They carry pictures of their own family heroes, personalising the memory of a terrible war and paying tribute to those who served in the Red Army to save the world from Hitler’s evil. 

This people’s celebration, the Immortal Regiment, was started in Siberia, in the city of Tomsk, and spread across the country, and abroad. 

Here, we glimpse these moving ceremonies across both the Far East of Russia and Siberia. 

Vladivostok: 40,000 people walked with portraits of their ancestors, who took part in WWII. 

This was the seventh time the action was held in this city. 

This year a large delegation from the People's Republic of China took part in the 'Immortal Regiment' in Vladivostok.

They also carried portraits of their loved ones.

Khabarovsk: about 50,000 people took part in the commemoration. 

Khabarovsk Communists marched through the central streets of the regional capital with portraits of Soviet marshals. 

They marched in a column of the 'Immortal Regiment', ignoring a ban on the use of the image of Josef Stalin, who was the USSR’s wartime leader. 

No-one dared to hinder them despite an apparently breach in a non-political commemoration.

Party spokesman Evgeny Popov said: ’The Immortal Regiment without portraits of Stalin and other Soviet Marshals of Victory, as well as without Red flags, Red ribbons and Red Victory Banners cannot be considered full-fledged - and completely loses its meaning. 

’It was under the red banners with the hammer and sickle that the Soviet people achieved this Great Victory, and this was done under the leadership of Josef Stalin and Communist military leaders. 

‘Prohibiting the memory of those without whom this victory would not exist at all, is simply nonsense.’

Magadan: The participants ran into the thousands. 

Blagoveshchensk: More than 20,000 people took part. According to the organisers, in six years the number of participants has increased 18 times.

Yakutsk: Some 40,000 took part - compared with 2,000 seven years ago. 

For many, the march of the regiment was a duty that must be performed in memory of the hero in the family.

So, in the column went Roman Okhlopkov - one of the seven sons of the Hero of the Soviet Union and the famous 'Sniper-Sakha' Fedor Okhlopkov. 

Roman said: 'We carry a portrait of our father, Fedor Matveyevich. We participate every year. 

‘There are many of us, and each of us carries a portrait of our father and flowers to lay them at the monument on Victory Square.' 

An epic picture came from Chokurdakh village, Yakutia where people marched despite a strong blizzard. Chokurdakh is above the Arctic Circle.

Chita: More than 10,000 took part, shouting: 'Spasibo!' (Thank you!). 

Irkutsk: 15,000 people took part in the march. 

Krasnoyarsk: A large march commemorated the war heroes. 

Novosibirsk: Some quarter of a million people walked in the Immortal Regiment in Siberia’s largest city.

Tomsk:  A line two kilometres long was reported in the historic city of Tomsk, where the Immortal Regiment action first started.

Omsk: Thousands of people marched in the city.

In the column were veterans, people with disabilities, babies in prams, parents carrying children, all carrying pictures of their family heroes.

A passerby said told his children: ‘Look at how many veterans are in the portraits, how many people fought ... for our sake!'

Tyumen: Among the many participants was a Jewish family headed by the Chief Rabbi of Tyumen and the Tyumen Region ─ Yerakhmiel Gorelik. They moved to the region 10 years ago from Israel.