The message of congratulations reads, in part:
“The Leningrad Blockade was fully lifted 68 years ago. We bow our heads before the courage of the city’s people and those who took part in its defence. They gave the whole world an example of unbending steadfastness, will and devotion to their fatherland.
It is our duty to remember the 900 terrible days of the siege and hand this memory down to our children and grandchildren. We must do all we can to ensure that this, one of the most tragic pages in human history, is never repeated.”
January 27 is the Day of Military Glory, commemorating the same day in 1944, when Soviet troops fully lifted the Leningrad Blockade, ending the siege that German forces had inflicted on the city since September 8, 1941. Up to a million people in the city starved to death or died in shelling during the siege.