EX-SOVIET STATES REMEMBER HUGE LOSSES ON NAZI ATTACK ANNIVERSARY

Eighty years to the day after the Nazi dictatorship in Germany tore up a non-aggression policy with the Soviet Union and turned its sights on war with Moscow, leaders across the region took time to remember the horrors of World War II.

Wreaths were laid on memorials to the Soviet Union's war dead in Berlin, Brest, Kiev and Moscow, Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa) reported. In Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky led a moment of silence.

Those gathered at the Belarusian ceremony in Brest, which lies on its Polish border, let white balloons fly into the sky, according to the Belta news agency.

In Berlin, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier laid a wreath at a memorial for Soviet soldiers, while Russian President Vladimir Putin did the same at a memorial to unknown soldiers near the Kremlin Wall in Moscow.

Putin also took the opportunity to write a guest editorial for Germany's Die Zeit newspaper, in which he alternated between highlighting challenges that Europe and Russia can tackle together and blasting NATO and the European Union (EU) for regional instability.

After arguing that there was room to cooperate on climate and environmental problems and security in his article, Putin turned to say that many of the existing problems on the continent can be traced back to EU and NATO policies.

"The basis of the growing mutual mistrust in Europe lies in the eastward encroachment of the military alliance," wrote Putin, arguing that European interests had lent support to a "weaponized, unconstitutional coup" in Ukraine, a reference to the 2014 demonstrations that drove out Viktor Yanukovych, who was closely allied to Moscow.

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