Street Outside Russian Embassy in Washington May Be Renamed for a Dissident

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WASHINGTON — At a Washington city council meeting this past week, Zhanna Nemtsova held aloft a blue sign with Russian script in white. The words, she said, translated as “Nemtsov Bridge.” The sign itself was a copy of ones left on a stretch of sidewalk in Moscow where her father, the Russian democratic activist Boris Y. Nemtsov, was gunned down in 2015.

American officials have waged a bitter battle with Russia after accusing Moscow of meddling in the 2016 presidential election. The fight has also hit the streets of the American capital — if only symbolically.

The council was considering whether to rename a block outside the Russian Embassy in honor of Mr. Nemtsov, a former deputy prime minister and sharp critic of President Vladimir V. Putin. Local officials listened sympathetically as Ms. Nemtsova, who flew in from Germany for the meeting, described how an impromptu shrine in Moscow to her late father, erected on a bridge just blocks from Red Square, keeps being dismantled by Russian officials.

“For now, we cannot do it in Russia because of unprecedented resistance, but we have a chance to do it here,” she said. “And here, it will be difficult to dismantle.”

Renaming the stretch of Wisconsin Avenue in northwest Washington would have no effect on the Russian Embassy’s mailing address.

There is precedent for such a change: In the 1980s, congressional leaders renamed the location of the embassy’s former site, then near the White House, as Sakharov Plaza. It was a protest of the arrest and detention of a leading Russian dissident and nuclear physicist, Andrei Sakharov, the 1975 Nobel Peace Prize laureate who was exiled for criticizing the government of the Soviet Union.

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Because Congress has oversight of Washington, it reviews legislation passed by the District of Columbia Council, the city’s governing body. The plan to rename the street in front of the Russian Embassy for Mr. Nemtsov was hatched in February by Senator Marco Rubio, Republican of Florida, but has gone nowhere.

Washington’s overwhelmingly Democratic council picked it up at the end of the summer because, as Councilmember Mary M. Cheh put it, “this is the least we can do, symbolically, to honor the people who give their lives” for democracy.

During this week’s hearing, Jeremy Bigwood, a Washington-based photojournalist, voiced concerns that renaming the stretch of street would aggravate tensions between Russia and the United States. Five men were convicted this year in Mr. Nemtsov’s death, but his family and supporters suspect the Kremlin in his killing, especially given that he was considering running against Mr. Putin in elections scheduled for next year. The Kremlin has denied any connection to Mr. Nemtsov’s death.

“This will look like Washington, D.C., raising a middle finger to the Russian Embassy,” Mr. Bigwood said. “It’s just not a good idea. There is no hard evidence that the Russian government was responsible for Nemtsov’s assassination.”

Ms. Cheh and Vladimir Kara-Murza, the chairman of the Boris Nemtsov Foundation for Freedom, argued that the proposal sought mainly to memorialize Mr. Nemtsov’s legacy. They said it would be protected in Washington, in contrast to the spot where Mr. Nemtsov was killed: It is continuously sanitized by Moscow officials who whisk away the flowers, photos and flickering candles left by his supporters.

“It’s not about blaming anyone,” said Mr. Kara-Murza, who has been poisoned twice while protesting Mr. Putin’s government. “Frankly, I think there’s nothing more patriotic, for me as a Russian citizen, to name the plaza, the square, in front of the Russian Embassy in memory of a Russian statesman.”

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In a statement, the Russian Embassy press secretary, Nikolay Lakhonin, avoided discussing the proposed street renaming except to note Mr. Putin’s condolence message to Mr. Nemtsov’s mother hours after the assassination.

Ms. Cheh said she felt confident that the council bill would be approved relatively quickly next year, although it could be blocked by Congress. A district Transportation Department official estimated that it would cost about $170 to install signs on the block to designate the new name.

Mr. Kara-Murza said he hoped the street would be renamed in time to recognize the third anniversary of Mr. Nemtsov’s assassination in February.

Congress previously has sought to rename the Chinese Embassy’s address in honor of Liu Xiaobo, the now deceased dissident and Nobel laureate; Beijing has called that effort “a political farce.” In 2014, Chinese commentators retaliated by suggesting renaming the street in front of the American Embassy in Beijing as “Snowden Street” or “Osama bin Laden Road.” But they never took action.

Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, also introduced bipartisan legislation in March to rename the street where the Cuban Embassy is in Washington as “Oswaldo Payá Way,” after the longtime opponent to Fidel Castro’s government. It has not been approved.

Ms. Cheh described the constant drumbeat by repressive foreign leaders as “a little demoralizing.”

“But we can’t let that interfere with our expression of support whenever we have the opportunity,” she said.