Several countries, especially European ones, have decided to change the names of streets and squares near their Russian embassies in support of the Ukrainian people. A practice already observed in history in other contexts.
Failing to engage militarily in Ukraine, several countries, especially European ones, have decided to change the names of streets and squares near their Russian embassies in support of the Ukrainian people. In Norway, the crossroads in front of the Russian embassy in central Oslo didn’t really have a name until last Tuesday. The city council then decided to call it “Ukrainas Plass”, or Ukraine Square. Russian embassy staff will therefore soon have to pass a sign identifying the area as Ukraine’s place when they go to work.
Further south in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, an unnamed street leading to the Russian Embassy was officially dubbed “Ukrainian Hero Street” on Wednesday. The city’s mayor, Remigijus Simasius, added that mail might not be delivered to the embassy if he did not use the new address. “Anyone who writes a letter to the embassy should think of the victims of Russian aggression and the heroes of Ukraine,” he said in a Facebook post.
Tirana, the Albanian capital, said it would name a street segment where the Russian embassy is located “Free Ukraine”. In Latvia, the Russian Embassy in Riga will now be on “Ukrainian Independence Street”, according to a local deputy mayor. And in Copenhagen, Denmark, city officials will next week discuss renaming the street the Russian embassy is on from “Kristianiagade” to “Ukrainegade.”
When Iran Trolled the British
In the United Kingdom, parliamentarians are pleading for the address of the Russian Embassy in London to become “Zelensky Avenue”, named after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who spoke on Tuesday before the British House of Commons. ‘Britain must shame Putin at every possible opportunity’said Layla Moran, spokeswoman for the Liberal Democrats for foreign affairs.
Is it the Iranian precedent that inspires the British representatives? Because before the Russians, the United Kingdom itself was the target of this type of symbolic commitment. As the American podcast tells 99% Hidden, after the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979, to show its opposition to the British regime, the city of Tehran changed the name of the street where the entrance to the British embassy is located. It was then called “Rue Winston Churchill”. The city decides to change this name to “Rue Bobby Sands”, named after an Irish nationalist MP who died following a hunger strike in an English prison. Never mind: the embassy ended up opening another entrance on Ferdowsi Avenue. Funny, isn’t it?