STRATEGIC ASSESSMENT. Moscow. Local authorities in cities across Russia have removed banners with the letter “Z” – a symbol of support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine – in recent days as the war appears to enter a new phase of bloody fighting and limited territorial gains in eastern Ukraine.
The head of the A Just Russia political party, Sergei Mironov, said earlier this week that Moscow city inspectors ordered him to take down a pro-war banner from the party’s headquarters in the Russian capital.
At least one other pro-war Z-banner appears to have been removed in downtown Moscow, in addition to cases in cities including St. Petersburg, Novosibirsk and Kirov, according to local media reports.
“It might be some kind of rebranding. The war has clearly stalled both politically and militarily,” Abbas Gallyamov, a political analyst and former speechwriter for Russian President Vladimir Putin, told The Moscow Times.
The banner on A Just Russia’s offices was removed after “numerous appeals by citizens,”Mironov said Wednesday in a post on messaging app Telegram.
He added that “nothing reminds you of the war” in Moscow anymore.
The letters “Z” and “V,” initially used as recognition markers by Russian forces in Ukraine, were adopted as a popular symbol of support for Russian troops — used in school flash mobs, displays on buildings, T-Shirts and even as decoration on food.
While there is no evidence of a mass rejection of the Z symbol, its removal from some public spaces in major cities could suggest that the Kremlin is seeking to portray the war in a different light as the fighting approaches its fourth month without a Russian breakthrough.
A photo posted Thursday appeared to show workers removing a banner with the Z letter that proclaimed “For the President! For the Army! For Victory!” from the main office of state-owned Russian Railways in central Moscow (Moscow Times).
