US and Russia Having a Strange Street-Name Spat

The US embassy in Moscow currently has the ho-hum address of Bolshoy Devyatinsky Lane, 8. But if a Russian lawmaker gets his way, the address will soon be North American Dead End, 1. The reason is a bizarre spat going on over street names. As RT reports, it began when city officials in Washington, DC, changed the name of the street on which the Russian embassy sits to Boris Nemtsov Plaza, in recognition of a Russian opposition figure who was murdered in 2015.

The move irked senior Duma lawmaker Mikhail Degtyarev, who proposed that Russia respond in tit-for-tat fashion. "Moscow is an ancient, historic city, unlike Washington," he said, per DW.com. "That is why we will not change the pre-existing street names or alley names over fleeting political ambitions or disputes. However, we might as well change the mailing address of a no-name dead end street." City officials in Moscow say they will formally consider the name change later this month. (More Russia stories.)