Russian President Vladimir Putin made an appearance at huge flag-waving rally at a packed Moscow stadium.

The Moscow rally, marking the eighth anniversary of Russia’s annexation of Crimea, which was seized from Ukraine, is suggested to have been a theatrically manipulated display of patriotism, to draw away from antiwar protests inside Russia.

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“Shoulder to shoulder, they help and support each other,” the Russian President said of the Kremlin’s forces. “We have not had unity like this for a long time”.

Unverified reports say that the event was papered by students and employees of state institutions who were ordered to attend rallies and concerts marking the anniversary.  

The rally was garnished by patriotic songs including Made in the USSR, with the opening lines “Ukraine and Crimea, Belarus and Moldova, it’s all my country”.

The event, which Ukrainian officials have characterised as an opportunity “to provoke tension in the media”, played out on Friday, just as Russian missiles struck an aircraft repair plant in Ukraine’s western city of Lviv.

The airstrip is situated about 80km away from the border with Poland, which has become a haven for hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian refugees. 

Bombing was also reported in the eastern city of Kharkiv, where a multi-storey teaching building had been shelled, killing one person, wounding 11 and trapping one other in the rubble, according to local officials.

Shells also apparently struck residential and administrative buildings the eastern city of Kramatorsk, killing two people and wounding six, according to the regional governor, Pavlo Kyrylenko.

While, in the northern part of the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, one person was killed and four others were wounded when a Russian missile fell on a building, according to emergency services. 

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko said 19 were wounded in the shelling.

The death toll remains unclear, although thousands of civilians and soldiers, from both camps are believed to have been killed.

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