Ukraine's cities get rid of Russia's legacy..even the names of poets and creators

A number of Ukrainian cities are planning to rename streets and squares connected to Russia.

A day after dismantling a massive Soviet-era monument in Kyiv designed to symbolize friendship between Russia and Ukraine, the city council said today it has compiled a list of 467 sites that could be considered for renaming.

These include a central square named after the famous late writer Leo Tolstoy and a street named after Russia's Lake Baikal.

The road, named after Minsk, the capital of Belarus, a close ally of Russia, is also on the list.

Since Ukraine declared independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, it has changed city names to erase the legacy of hated Soviet officials.

Officials now want the names of Russian authors, poets and mountain ranges removed.

Ihor Terekov, mayor of eastern Ukraine's Kharkiv, said on Wednesday that once the war with Russia is over, a bill will be submitted to his city council to rename named places belonging to Russia.

"Even without these names, there will be many wounds that will long remind us of what kind of neighbors we have on our eastern and northern borders," he wrote on Telegram.

Cities and towns in northern Ukraine began the process of renaming streets after the army units that defended them.

Moscow describes its military action as a "special operation" to disarm Ukraine and defeat the fascists.

As for Ukraine and the West, they say that these allegations are baseless and that the war is an unjustified act of aggression.

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