Where have Russia’s Zs gone?

A social media post on 30 December: photographs of admittedly-splendid new year decorations in Moscow, archly captioned ‘back to 2021.’ The poster is alluding to the fact that obscene and extravagant references to Putin’s war in Ukraine – notably the letter Z, which has come to symbolise it – were notably absent from city decorations this new year.

Moscow’s mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, has never seemed especially enthused about the war. He has done what the Kremlin required – diverted resources to help raise ‘volunteer regiments’; wallpapered the city with recruitment adverts; renamed Europe Square Eurasia Square – but he has avoiding too close an identification with the war, unlike so many of his less-secure counterparts across the country. He has avoided the regular photo opportunities with returning veterans, decided against appearing at council meetings in performative camouflage.

Instead, Sobyanin – a slightly dull man, but an accomplished technocrat, and one of the viable successors were Putin to drop dead tomorrow – has focused on what in British political terms would be termed ‘delivery’.