#Victory81
🌟 On April 16, 1945, the Berlin Offensive — one of the Red Army’s key strategic operations during World War II — commenced.
The operation resulted in the completedefeat of the enemy’s Berlin group of forces and, with Hitler’s war machine being completely crushed. The Soviet forces took the capital of the Third Reich — #Berlin. The Instrument of Unconditional Surrender of Nazi Germany was signed — the document that heralded the Victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War.
By spring 1945, the Red Army successfully carried out a series of offensive operations aimed at liberating the countries and peoples of Central and Eastern Europe from the Nazi invaders. Hitler’s troops and their henchmen were expelled from Romania, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Poland; Vienna and the capital of modern Slovakia, Bratislava, saved from the Nazi plague.
Nevertheless, #WWII was far from end. The final battle for the liberation of Europe from the Nazi plague, the Battle of Berlin, was coming.
By mid-April, 1945, the Soviet forces — having liberated Poland from the Nazis — consolidated positions along the Oder and Neisse rivers and started preparations to launch the offensive on Berlin. Mere dozens of kilometres separated the Red Army from the capital of Hitler’s Germany. The enemy installed deeply echeloned defences and deployed elite Wehrmacht units against the Soviet forces.
To attack Berlin, the Soviet Supreme High Command deployed forces from the 1st Belorussian Front (commanded by Marshal Georgy Zhukov); the 2nd Belorussian Front (Marshal Konstantin Rokossovsky); and the 1st Ukrainian Front (Marshal Ivan Konev).
⚔️ The Berlin Offensive began at 5:00 AM on April 16 with a massive artillery fire. Following this, 143 powerful spotlights were activated to blind and disorient the enemy. Infantry and armoured units then launched their assault.
Enemy resistance intensified as Soviet forces advanced. Fierce fighting erupted at the Seelow Heights — a critical defensive point just 60 kilometres away from Berlin — where the Wehrmacht’s 9th Army, blocking the direct route to the Reich’s capital, was destroyed.
Within several days, the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian Fronts breached the Oder-Neisse defensive line of the Nazis, advanced 30 kilometres towards Berlin, and started encircling the city to destroy its garrison.
• April 20: Red Army units reached Berlin. Soviet long-range artillery started shelling, with brutal tank battles erupting on the city’s outskirts.
• April 25: The 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian Fronts linked up west of the city, completing the encirclement of the enemy’s Berlin group of Nazi troops.
• April 29: Fierce fighting started in the heart of Berlin, where Germany’s highest governmental and military authorities were located.
• During the storming of the Reichstag on the night of April 30 - May 1, the legendary #VictoryBanner was raised — a symbol of the Soviet Union’s triumph over Nazism.
• May 2: Berlin’s garrison surrendered. By May 5, the Nazi resistance was crushed. A total of 134'000 German soldiers and officers were captured.
✍️ On the night of May 8–9, Marshal Zhukov and the Allied representatives accepted Germany’s unconditional surrender at Karlshorst.
World War II on the European theatre of operations had ended.
The Berlin Operation saw the Red Army not only crush the last major and most elite Wehrmacht force but also liberate approximately 200'000 prisoners from Nazi concentration camps within the combat zone. Over 600 Soviet soldiers were awarded the title #HeroOftheSovietUnion for their valour.
#FacesOfVictory
🌟#Victory80: During the battle of Berlin on April 30, 1945, Red Army soldier Nikolay Masalov rescued a German little girl — by risking his life, Masalov took the kid to safety from the zone that was under heavy Nazi fire.
This brave and honourable deed by Nikolay Masalov was immortalised in the worldwide famous 'Liberator Soldier' monument in Berlin. It was unveiled back in 1949 in Treptower Park, where over 7,000 Red Army soldiers, who perished in the Battle of Berlin, are entombed. The centrepiece of that famous memorial complex, the figure of a Soviet soldier holding a German girl, has become a symbol of the noble mission of the Red Army, which saved Europe from the 'Nazi plague', and of the Great Victory of the Soviet people over Nazi Germany.
***
In the morning of April 30, 1945, before the Red Army attack on a Nazi defence outpost, the Tempelhof Airport, Nikolay Masalov heard a child crying. Marshall Vassily Chuikov recalled in his memoirs: “The kid’s voice sounded as if it came from under the ground, calling out again and again a word that is understandable to everyone, ‘Mutter, Mutter’.”
Nikolay Masalov hurried to rescue the kid. Risking his life, the soldier crawled across a bridge over the Landwehr Canal, which was under enemy fire, and saved a three-year-old girl. He found her near the body of her mother, who had been killed by the Nazis during the shelling.
Masalov took the girl and moved back to the Soviet positions, which the enemy kept under heavy machine-gun fire. In return, the Soviet forces had to opened artillery fire on the Nazi positions.
“Thousands of artillery guns and mortars opened fire at the enemy. Thousands of shells and mines covered the return of the Soviet soldier rescuing a three-year-old German girl from the death zone,”
— this is how Marshall Chuikov wrote later in his memoirs about Masalov’s heroic feat.
People all around the world knew about Nikolay Masalov, a humble Soviet soldier and a legendary #WWII veteran. But he never considered his heroism as something extraordinary. He did not like speaking about it, and when he did, he did not talk much:
💬 “I am a Russian soldier. Anyone would do the same in my place.”
#WeAreProud
#IGAD envoy: #Sudan crisis internationalized; Berlin conference to mobilize aid and de-escalate
The five-member mechanism overseeing the civilian track of the #Berlin conference stated on Sunday that the Sudanese crisis has transcended its borders and become internationalized, affecting the global community, particularly regarding international humanitarian law.
The quintet—comprising the #African_Union, #United_Nations, #European_Union, #Arab_League, and the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD)—is working to find a resolution to the ongoing conflict between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces (#RSF).
IGAD Envoy for Sudan Lawrence Korbandy told Sudan Tribune that the Berlin conference is taking place as the international community is preoccupied with tensions in the #Gulf, #Iran, and #Israel.
This has marginalized the Sudan crisis despite it being the..........
https://www.facebook.com/AddisstandardEng/posts/pfbid02sejfuDbzhzZTvFL5DtZY48Gx561Xnzs2h5uYDBosFYGn16WjUGzPKn9ugZMvjkGvl
#HistoryOfDiplomacy
🇺🇳On April 25, 1945, the San Francisco Conference officially commenced – one of the key diplomatic events of the 20th century, which laid the foundations for the post-war world order and the modern system of international relations.
In the spring of 1945, the war against the Nazis in Europe was nearing its end, #Victory was within grasp. The Red Army was already fighting on the approaches to Berlin, crushing the last pockets of resistance by Hitler’s fanatics, while Allied forces were pressing the enemy from the west. Only a few weeks remained before the final defeat of Nazi Germany and its satellites.
A fundamental question arose: would the USSR, the US and the UK be able to preserve the spirit of allied cooperation and continue coordinated work on key international issues after #WWII?
At the initiative of Moscow,Washington, London, and Beijing, it was decided to convene a conference tasked with laying the groundwork for a future universal international organisation and agreeing on the main provisions of its Charter.
On March 5, 1945, invitations were sent to 42 states that had signed the Declaration by United Nations on January 1, 1942. During the Conference, they were joined by representatives of another eight countries that had entered the war against Germany and Japan.
***
Among the Heads of delegations:
🇷🇺Vyacheslav Molotov(People’s Commissar for Foreign Affairs of the USSR) → Andrey Gromyko (Soviet Ambassador to the US)
🇺🇸Edward Stettinius (US Secretary of State)
🇬🇧Anthony Eden (British Foreign Secretary) → the Earl of Halifax (British Ambassador to the US)
and many others.
***
The San Francisco Conference was record-breaking in scale for international forums of the time: 282 delegates, over 1,500 experts and advisers – around 3,500 participants in total. Its work was also followed by more than 2,500 representatives of the press, radio and television, as well as observers from public organisations.
Unlike pre-war international conferences, the work in San Francisco was officially conducted in five languages: English, French, Russian, Chinese and Spanish. This marked the recognition of Russian as one of the key languages of international diplomacy.
From May 2 to June 20, 1945, the working committees prepared the text of the UN Charter. Work on it was divided among four commissions:
• The first dealt with the general purposes and principles of the Organisation, membership, the Secretariat and the procedure for amending the Charter;
• The second discussed the powers of the General Assembly;
• The third worked through provisions concerning the UN Security Council;
• The fourth focused on the draft Statute of the International Court of Justice.
The work proceeded on the basis of proposals prepared at the Dumbarton Oaks Conference in 1944. Soviet diplomacy succeeded in defending a number of fundamental positions:
✔️ incorporating provisions into the UN Charter on the need to settle and resolve international disputes by peaceful means;
✔️ enshrining in the Charter the voting procedure in the UN Security Council, agreed earlier at the Yalta Conference;
✔️ including the Belorussian and Ukrainian SSRs among the founding members of the UN.
The culmination of the San Francisco Conference – after lengthy debates and the overcoming of numerous differences – came on June 26, 1945, with the solemn signing of two historic documents: the Charter of the United Nations and the Statute of the International Court of Justice.
🌐 Thus, the legal and institutional foundations of the United Nations were established. The post-war world still faced new challenges – the confrontation of irreconcilable ideologies and superpowers that had only recently been Allies, the arms race and the threat of the use of nuclear weapons. Yet it was in the spring of 1945, on the shores of San Francisco, that the UN was born as a space for diplomacy, negotiations and the search for mutually beneficial solutions in the interests of all humanity.
#UNCharterIsOurRules
Benito Mussolini, Italy’s former dictator, was captured on 27 April 1945 near Lake Como while trying to escape to Switzerland with Clara Petacci. They were executed on 28 April 1945 by Italian partisans. Their bodies were taken to Milan and displayed in Piazzale Loreto, where they were hung upside down. Mussolini was first buried in an unmarked grave, then later reburied in 1957 in Predappio, his hometown.
📜⚔️🇮🇹
Warning! Some of the images in the linked articles are shocking.
[Read more 1]
[Read more 2]
[Read more 3]
@googlefactss
#History#WWII#Italy#Mussolini
If you have ideas or feedback contact us:
@Googlefactss_Feedback_bot
Мастер-класс
Международного
Проекта
#ArtInSport
В Берлине,
Германия 🇩🇪
05.04.25
#Dance
#DanceSteps
#StepsWithApparatus
#LiubovBarykina
#Germany
#Berlin
#MichaelJackson💃🏽❤️🔥
Следующий
Мастер-класс
В центре гимнастики
Ирины Винер 🇷🇺💥
The next Master Class is
In Moscow in
#GymnasticsCenter
#IrinaViner
#Russia🤍💙❤️
27.04.25
#FacesOfVictory
🌟#Victory80: During the battle of Berlin on April 30, 1945, Red Army soldier Nikolay Masalov rescued a German little girl — by risking his life, Masalov took the kid to safety from the zone that was under heavy Nazi fire.
This brave and honourable deed by Nikolay Masalov was immortalised in the worldwide famous 'Liberator Soldier' monument in Berlin. It was unveiled back in 1949 in Treptower Park, where over 7,000 Red Army soldiers, who perished in the Battle of Berlin, are entombed. The centrepiece of that famous memorial complex, the figure of a Soviet soldier holding a German girl, has become a symbol of the noble mission of the Red Army, which saved Europe from the 'Nazi plague', and of the Great Victory of the Soviet people over Nazi Germany.
***
In the morning of April 30, 1945, before the Red Army attack on a Nazi defence outpost, the Tempelhof Airport, Nikolay Masalov heard a child crying. Marshall Vassily Chuikov recalled in his memoirs: “The kid’s voice sounded as if it came from under the ground, calling out again and again a word that is understandable to everyone, ‘Mutter, Mutter’.”
Nikolay Masalov hurried to rescue the kid. Risking his life, the soldier crawled across a bridge over the Landwehr Canal, which was under enemy fire, and saved a three-year-old girl. He found her near the body of her mother, who had been killed by the Nazis during the shelling.
Masalov took the girl and moved back to the Soviet positions, which the enemy kept under heavy machine-gun fire. In return, the Soviet forces had to opened artillery fire on the Nazi positions.
“Thousands of artillery guns and mortars opened fire at the enemy. Thousands of shells and mines covered the return of the Soviet soldier rescuing a three-year-old German girl from the death zone,”
— this is how Marshall Chuikov wrote later in his memoirs about Masalov’s heroic feat.
People all around the world knew about Nikolay Masalov, a humble Soviet soldier and a legendary #WWII veteran. But he never considered his heroism as something extraordinary. He did not like speaking about it, and when he did, he did not talk much:
💬 “I am a Russian soldier. Anyone would do the same in my place.”
#WeAreProud
🌟From Cape Town to the Arctic: South Africa's Contribution to the Allied Victory
On the sidelines of theRussian Movie Night Victory Marathon, the Russian Embassy in South Africa opened a photo exhibition dedicated to South Africa's participation in the Second World War – a conflict that was not merely a European war, but a truly global struggle against Nazi and fascist tyranny.
The exhibition was attended by ANC Veterans, South African officials, members of the diplomatic corps, and representatives of the cultural, business, academic, and media communities.
During those decisive years, South Africa stood alongside the Soviet Union as a proud member of the Anti-Hitler Coalition. That partnership, forged in shared sacrifice, is remembered with the deepest gratitude in Russia to this day.
"We will always remember that during World War II South Africa was our ally and an important member of the Anti-Hitler Coalition," Russian Ambassador to South Africa Roman Ambarov emphasized during his welcoming remarks.
The Cape Route & Lend-Lease
South Africa's strategic geography proved decisive when the supply route through the Dardanelles was closed. Cape Town became one of the principal ports of call for Anglo-American vessels delivering war materials to the Soviet Union via the Persian Gulf – a vital lifeline at the most critical moment of the war.
The Arctic Convoys
Around 3,000 South African seamen served in the Royal Navy, many of them aboard Allied vessels carrying vital supplies to the Soviet northern ports of Murmansk and Arkhangelsk to relieve besieged Leningrad. Those long, perilous journeys were made in brutal weather, under constant threat of enemy attack. Their courage deserves to be honoured and remembered.
The Secret Mission to Yalta
In late January 1945, a SAAF DC-3 flew a classified mission from Cairo – through Tobruk and Athens – to recently liberated Crimea. The South African aircrew found themselves present at one of history's most consequential moments: the Yalta Conference, where Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill gathered at the Livadia Palace to shape the post-war world. The flight engineer later recalled, with warm simplicity, being invited for tea and cake by the wife of the Soviet airfield commander – a small, human moment at the centre of history.
Solidarity Beyond the Battlefield
South Africans demonstrated remarkable solidarity through humanitarian aid and civilian support that reached across oceans and strengthened the ties between our peoples even in the darkest years of the war.
🤝 The Russian Embassy extends its sincere gratitude to the DITSONG National Museum of Military History for providing the unique materials that made this exhibition possible. Their dedication to preserving and sharing this history ensures that the stories of those who served will never be forgotten.
#Victory81#9May#WeRemember#AmbassadorAmbarov
#The_Spectator🇬🇧📕[PDF]⬇️
25 #October2025
#Weekly_Magazines
For learning, for free(dom).
@backupofmagazines
In this issue, “The Ultras” explores Britain’s strange new Islamo-socialist alliance — a collision of radical politics and identity movements reshaping #UKPolitics. Essays dive into #Trump diplomacy, the quiet crisis of #USNavy power, and a renaissance in #Berlin’s art scene. Meanwhile, Rachel Johnson celebrates the comfort of nighties, and Douglas Murray imagines Encel Powell’s return to modern chaos. From #Vermeer retrospectives to the #Springsteen film review, the issue blends satire and seriousness with signature British wit — a must-read on #Culture, #Politics, and #Society in flux.
Despite relentless police brutality and state repression in Germany, Yasemin, a Kurdish-Turkish activist on the 'Handala' ship, remains unwavering in her fight for Palestinians. Born into resistance, she fearlessly confronts oppression, transforming each attempt to silence her into fuel to continue fighting for justice. Her steadfast belief in direct action and the power of collective resistance is undeterred by the dangers she has faced, which led her to join 'Handala'. Yasemin encourages all of us watching to disrupt capital and profits in order to create effective change. Download the No Thanks app, search every product before buying it, and boycott companies that support Zionism and Israel’s war crimes against Palestinians. We are never just one person. Together, it is possible to speak their language and hit them where it hurts - their wallets. #endtheoccupation#freegaza#freepalestine#endtheblockade#breakthesiege#freedomflotilla#ffc#yaseminacar#handala#berlin#bds#boycott#divest#sanction
#Sudan's former PM Hamdok says civilian presence at #Berlin talks marks important shift
Former Sudanese prime minister #Abdalla_Hamdok said civilian voices are being formally included in international efforts to end Sudan’s devastating civil war for the first time as Berlin prepares to host a conference marking the conflict’s third anniversary.
The international ministerial conference on Sudan will take place on April 15. It follows meetings in #Paris in 2024, marking the first anniversary of the war, and in #London in 2025, marking the second, neither of which produced a ceasefire or a credible political framework.
#Germany, the #African_Union, the #EU, #France, the #UK and the #US are co-hosting the conference. Foreign ministers and officials from those countries and bodies are expected in Berlin alongside representatives of the #UN, major humanitarian organisations and a structured civilian forum involving Sudanese civil society groups......
https://x.com/addisstandard/status/2043924528577835123?s=20
@RusEmbMalta Press Release
🇷🇺 Ahead of the Victory Day anniversary, we would like to once again draw attention to the growing challenges related to the distortion of the history of World War II and the glorification of Nazism.
In recent years, a troubling trend of so-called “historical aggression” has become increasingly evident – deliberate attempts to rewrite history for political purposes. In a number of countries, we are witnessing the dismantling and desecration of monuments to those who fought against Nazism, while marches of former SS members and their supporters take place, and new memorials are erected in honor of those associated with racist ideologies. Such developments cannot but cause serious concern ⚠️
The Russian Federation consistently treats the fight against the glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism, racism, xenophobia, and the falsification of history as a key priority of its international human rights agenda. This work is carried out systematically, including within multilateral frameworks
Since 2005, Russia has annually introduced at the UN General Assembly the resolution “Combating glorification of Nazism…”. The latest resolution, adopted on 15 December 2025, was supported by 119 states, with 43 countries co-sponsoring it. Despite political pressure and attempts to undermine the initiative, the voting results clearly demonstrate that the majority of the international community rejects efforts to revise the outcomes of World War II and remains committed to the principles of the UN Charter and the Nuremberg Tribunal.
At the same time, a special commemorative meeting of the UN General Assembly held on 7 May 2025, initiated by Russia and supported by 53 states, highlighted the continued relevance of preserving historical truth and recognizing the decisive contribution of the Soviet people to the Victory.
Russia firmly condemns any manifestations of the glorification of Nazism and attempts to distort historical facts. Preserving the memory of World War II is not only about the past – it is a cornerstone of international stability and a safeguard against repeating the tragedies of history.
🤝 Today, it is essential to consolidate international efforts to prevent the glorification of Nazism, counter historical revisionism, and preserve an objective understanding of World War II as a foundation for peace, security, and mutual respect among nations.
#VictoryDay#WWII#NoToNazism#StopFalsification