Max Hunder

(Reuters] Several Ukrainian cities have plans to rename Russian-related streets and squares in a process called “derussification” after Moscow’s invasion.

The city council announced Wednesday that it has compiled a list with 467 possible renaming options for the monument, which was built in Soviet-era Kyiv to symbolize friendship between Russia and Ukraine.

They included a central square named after 19th century writer Leo Tolstoy and a street named Russia’s Lake Baikal. Another road was named after Minsk (the capital of the close Russian ally Belarus).

Names of cities in Ukraine have changed since 1991 when the country declared its independence from the Soviet Union. This was to remove the Soviet legacy. Officials are now trying to get rid of the names and poems of Russian poets, authors, and mountain ranges.

Ihor Teredhov, the mayor of Kharkiv (an eastern Ukrainian city in the east), stated Wednesday that once the conflict with Russia is finished, he would present to his city council a bill for the renaming of places with Russian-affiliated titles. 

On Telegram, he said that “Even without these name(s), there will be to many scars which will remind us for long time about who is beyond our eastern or northern borders.” 

Cities and towns in Ukraine’s north have started the process of renaming streets after army units that defended them.

According to a proposal from the Chernihiv governor, the 1st Separate Tank Brigade would be named after streets and squares within the capital.

Oleksandr Tkachenko, Culture Minister warned last week that Russia should not be removed from all its associations.

Nikolai Gogol, an Ukrainian-born Russian novelist and poet, stated that “figures…belong the global stock of (cultural heritage) heritage.”

Moscow describes its military operation as a “special operations” in order to defeat the fascists and disarm Ukraine. The West and Ukraine both claim that the claims of fascists are unfounded and that this war was an unprovoked aggression.