On March 18, the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow will not hold a concert in honor of “the annexation of Crimea to Russia”, as was the case in 2022. As Vedomosti writes, citing a close source of the presidential administration, in 2023 “it was decided not to organize a large celebration”, but to organize “one-off events”.
In particular, in Moscow on Nikitsky Boulevard on March 20, a photo exhibition “Crimean Spring. We have been together for 9 years.” In the Magadan region, a campaign “Letter from Magadan” will take place, in which it will be possible to send postcards to the peninsula free of charge, and in Pskov, residents will be offered to “participate in the creation of the Scarlet Sails art object and learn to cook Crimean pastries.
At the end of February, it was reported that the concert-rally in Luzhniki on the occasion of the ninth anniversary of the annexation of Crimea had already started recruiting extras, including announcing a speech at an event for Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The corresponding announcement was posted in the Mega Volonter Moscow group on VKontakte, where previously recruited spectators at the “patriotic” rally-concert, which took place in Luzhniki on February 22. March 15, informed “Siren”, a message appeared in “Mega Volonter Moscow” that “there will be no big concert.” “For reasons beyond our control, on March 18, at the city level, the format of the celebration of the Day of Reunification of Crimea with Russia has been changed,” he said.
In 2022, in Russia, the eighth anniversary of the annexation of Crimea was celebrated less than a month after the start of a large-scale invasion by Russian troops in Ukraine. At that time, rallies, processions and concerts were held in all major Russian cities and, as reported by the Interior Ministry, 200,000 people gathered at the Luzhniki stadium, in front of which Putin stood Express.