Cars with Russian flags parade in Beirut on Feb. 26, 2023. (Credit: Philippe Hage Boutros)
BEIRUT — Around a dozen cars with Russian flags streaming from their windows paraded on Sunday morning in Beirut, in a show of solidarity with Moscow, one year after the Russian military invasion of Ukraine.
Photos taken by L'Orient-Le Jour's journalist show a small convoy of vehicles bearing Russia flags traveling through the Saint Nicolas neighborhood of Achrafieh. Video footage published on Twitter shows cars with Russian flags blasting Russian nationalist music on speakers.
Today, a car procession took place in Beirut to show support for Russia. The procession was organized by a group of individuals who wanted to express their solidarity with the Russian government. #Beirut #Russia #support pic.twitter.com/p1oBfP2A0m
— IntelSky (@Intel_Sky) February 26, 2023
On Friday, members of the Ukrainian community in Lebanon held a demonstration in downtown Beirut to mark one year since the Russian invasion of their home country.
Ukrainian citizens residing in Lebanon demonstrated several times in 2022 to protest the war in their country, including in front of the Russian Embassy in Beirut.
Russian citizens in Lebanon have also demonstrated over the course of the past year, to show solidarity with their home country's war on Ukraine.
Since Russian forces invaded Ukraine last year, the latter has shown fierce military resistance and, aided by the West, inflicted unexpected setbacks on Russian leader Vladimir Putin.
Russian troops entered Ukraine in the early hours of Feb. 24, 2022, launching the largest conflict in Europe since World War II. A year later, Ukrainian cities have been reduced to rubble, part of the country is under Russian occupation and both sides have killed or wounded more than 150,000 people each, according to Western estimates.
However, the Ukrainian army forced the Kremlin to give up on its capital Kyiv in the spring, then in the summer and fall pushed Russian forces into the northeast and south. Since then, the front has largely stabilized, but both sides are preparing new offensives.
In addition to the Crimea region annexed in 2014, Russia now claims as its own four other regions of eastern and southern Ukraine.
In Lebanon, the Russian invasion has meant stalled shipments of Ukrainian grain.
Additional reporting by Philippe Hage Boutros