All five Central Asian presidents are scheduled to attend a parade on Red Square on May 9 to commemorate the end of World War II in Europe in 1945, while the majority of the world's leaders continue to condemn Russia's ongoing unprovoked invasion of Ukraine launched in February 2022.
Yury Ushakov, an aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin, on May 7 said Kazakh President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev, Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoev, Tajik President Emomali Rahmon, Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov, and Turkmen President Serdar Berdymukhammedov will attend the event in the Russian capital’s Red Square.
Ushakov added that President Miguel Diaz-Canel of Cuba, President Thongloun Sisoulith of Laos, and President Umaro Sissoco Embalo of Guinea-Bissau will also be present.
The Kremlin said earlier that Putin will hold separate talks with leaders of Cuba, Laos, and Guinea-Bissau after the parade on May 9.
Armenian President Nikol Pashinian, who attended the celebrations last year, said earlier that he will not be able to take part in the event this year.
Under Putin, Russia has gone to great lengths to commemorate World War II -- which killed more than 20 million Soviet citizens -- including reviving the military parade on Red Square.
During his more than 20 years in power, Putin has increasingly tried to make the memory of what Russians call the Great Patriotic War an integral part of national identity.
Foreign attendance of the May 9 celebration has waned since Russia's illegal annexation in 2014 of the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine.
In 2021, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Tajikistan's Rahmon was the only head of state to attend the Victory Day parade.
In 2022, a little over two months after Russia's unprovoked full-scale invasion of Ukraine began, no foreign leaders came to the WWII celebrations in Moscow.
Putin and his officials traditionally hold meetings with foreign leaders and delegations around the May 9 celebration.
