If Streets are to Be Renamed, Putin Officials Now Insisting the New Names Be Those who Fought in Ukraine and Not Those from Tsarist Past, to the Outrage of Many

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 28 – Since the end of Soviet times, many Russians, especially those closely linked to the Orthodox church, have sought to restore tsarist era names to streets and other locations that the communist regime renamed for Soviet heroes. But now this process has taken on a new twist.

            Putin-era officials are insisting, a case in the city of Rzhev in Tver Oblast, suggests  that if the Soviet names are to be eliminated, they should be replaced not by their pre-Soviet and often religious ones but by the names of Russian soldiers who have died in Ukraine (vesti-tver.ru/dailynews/vo-rzheve-pereimenovali-tri-ulitsy/).

            Rzhev residents had long sought to remove the names of Marx and Uritsky from their streets and to restore the pre-Soviet names most of which were religious in origin and meaning in their stead. And when officials finally agreed to drop the Soviet names, they appear to have felt that they had a victory.

            But then they found out that officials were insisting that the streets now bear the names of two Russian soldiers, and the residents are outraged. The names of such heroes, they say, could be given to new streets, but the old names must be restored to the streets in the center of town (rusk.ru/newsdata.php?idar=118916).