• Parades commemorate Red Army's World War II victory

    Yuri Kadobnov / AFP - Getty Images

    Russian military jets fly above St. Basil's cathedral in Moscow's Red Square on May 9, 2013, during Russia's Victory Day parade.

    Alexander Zemlianichenko / AP

    Russian President Vladimir Putin, center, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, center right, and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, center left, watch the Victory Day Parade in Red Square on May 9, 2013.

    Ivan Sekretarev / AP

    In a haze of exhaust fumes, Russian self-propelled howitzers move across Red Square on May 9, 2013.

    Fighter jets screamed over Red Square and heavy tanks rumbled over its cobblestones as Russia flexed its military muscle on the 68th anniversary of its costly victory over Nazi Germany in World War II.

    Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the annual military parade in Moscow that Russia will be a guarantor of world security. Putin's short speech Thursday came at the culmination of Victory Day, Russia's most important secular holiday, which honors the country's huge military and civilian losses. 

    Commemorative events were also held in other former Soviet states and in Jerusalem.

    -- Agence France-Presse, The Associated Press

    Efrem Lukatsky / AP

    Cadets of the Ukrainian Military academy preparing to celebrate the anniversary of victory over the Nazis at a memorial to World War II veterans in a park in Kiev, Ukraine, on May 9, 2013.

    Andrey Smirnov / AFP - Getty Images

    Russian World War II veterans, former navy sailors, celebrate Victory Day at their traditional veterans' meeting in Gorky park in central Moscow on May 9, 2013.

    Abir Sultan / EPA

    A Jewish veteran accompanied by his grandson takes part in a parade marking the 68th anniversary of the victory of the Allies over Nazi Germany in Jerusalem, Israel, on May 9, 2013.

    Ivan Sekretarev / AP

    Russian soldiers march across Red Square on May 9, 2013.

    David Mdzinarishvili / Reuters

    Veterans chat during a Victory Day celebration in Tbilisi, Georgia, on May 9, 2013.

    Dumitru Doru / EPA

    A young girl lays flowers at the grave of fallen soldiers during celebrations to mark the 68th anniversary of Victory Day in Chisinau, Moldova, on May 9, 2013.

    Sergey Dolzhenko / EPA

    World War II-era military vehicles parade in downtown Kiev, Ukraine, on May 9, 2013.

    Related:

    Stories of Jewish Red Army vets just coming to light

    Holocaust survivors remember the horrors of Buchenwald

    In a grand display, Russian soldiers re-enact historic World War II march

  • Seeing where communism lives in the 21st century

    There was a time in the 20th century when the word "communism" got the same airplay as "terrorism" does now. Though it's no longer the focus of fear, communism didn't die out entirely at the end of the Cold War. It persists in a few states around the world, explored by photographer Tomas van Houtryve in his new book Behind the Curtains.

    Tomas van Houtryve / VII

    2009: An all girls group of Young Communist League members walks past a statue of Chairman Mao Zedong in front of the Yan'an Revolutionary Memorial Hall in Yan'an.

    Van Houtryve dealt with hair-raising circumstances in his quest: trekking in Nepal below military helicopters to find Maoists, impersonating a businessman to gain access to North Korea, and hiking deep into Laotian jungle to find hiding US-allied Hmong refugees left over from the Vietnam War.

    That last mission led to a heartbreaking meeting:

    Upon seeing us, some of the adults broke down in tears. They claimed not to have seen an American since the CIA pulled out of Laos more than three decades earlier.

    Having traveled to several war zones and natural disasters, I had never seen such a ragged and desperate group of people. It took a while before they were calm enough to explain their situation to us and submit to Thomas’ interviews. Five men came forward saying that they were CIA-trained veterans of the Secret War. They pulled forward family members to show their bullet and shrapnel scars from attacks by the Lao People’s Army.

    “If I surrender, I will be punished,” explained Xang Yang. “They will never forgive me,” he said of the Communist government. “I can not live outside the jungle because I am a former American soldier.”

    Tomas van Houtryve / VII

    2007: Relatives of veterans of the CIA Secret War break down in tears at their hidden village in the Vientiane province.

    Tomas van Houtryve / VII

    2006: People buy bread in a bakery in Havana.

    Tomas van Houtryve / VII

    2009: Papers fall out of the windows of the Parliament building while rioters ransack the inside in Chisinau, Moldova. Opposition leaders accused the Communists of rigging the recent elections and demanded a recount.

    In Nepal, van Houtryve hiked for days in the Himalaya to reach a Maoist-controlled area. Upon meeting a local militia group, he observed:

    The soldiers were much younger than I expected. Our minders had claimed that all fighters were over 18, but when Alex spoke to the battalion’s vice political commissar, he had a different reply. “According to Lenin, once they are 15, they can join the army.”

    Many were girls. One wearing a Britney Spears t-shirt caught my eye. I also spotted Spiderman, Jurassic Park and several Harley Davidson designs in the crowd. How had Britney’s image penetrated this remote area while the news of communism’s global collapse apparently had not?

    Tomas van Houtryve / VII

    2005: A Maoist rebel soldier wearing a Britney Spears t-shirt stands among a batallion of other soldiers of the People's Liberation Army, First Brigade, Mid Division during a drill in a schoolyard in the village of Gairigaon, Nepal.

    Book cover, Tomas van Houtryve's "Behind the Curtains."

    You can buy the book at the VII Photo Agency's store.  View an exhibit in New York and meet Tomas at a book signing in San Francisco.

    See more images in PhotoBlog from:

  • Honoring the victims of the Holocaust 67 years after the liberation of Auschwitz

    Bela Szandelszky / AP

    Holocaust survivor Eva Szirtes pays respect to relatives at a memorial wall bearing the engraved names of tens of thousands of victims of the Nazi Holocaust at the Holocaust Memorial Center, during Holocaust remembrance day in Budapest, Hungary, on Jan. 27. The remembrance day marks the day of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camps 67 years ago.

    Jim Hollander / EPA

    A visitor to the 'Hall of Names' in the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial museum in Jerusalem, Jan. 27. The room holds 600 portraits of individual Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis during the Holocaust of World War II and contains binders documenting more than 4,000,000 of those people. Today marks International Holocaust Remembrance Day on this day in 1945 that the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp was liberated by Soviet forces.

    John Mcconnico / AP

    A man smells a flower during the Holocaust remembrance memorial in Chisinau, Moldova on Jan. 27. The remembrance day marks the day of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camps 67 years ago.

    AP reports:

    It's a huge question for observant Jews: How can one still believe in a merciful God after suffering through the worst genocide in history?

    As the world marks Holocaust Remembrance Day on Friday, members of Israel's most devout group will remember the victims with prayer, study of scripture and a deep conviction in a grand plan that is beyond their earthly comprehension.

    Many notable survivors, including Nobel laureate Elie Wiesel, have famously questioned where God was during the Holocaust. But survivors from the insular ultra-Orthodox community say they felt a divine presence even in the worst places imaginable.

    Read the full story.