Inside the anti-Putin mecca

Russian president Vladimir Putin is despised so much in one Ukrainian city that his picture is regularly melded with an image of Hitler and printed onto products which allow locals to urinate and wipe their bottoms on his face.

Adding the Nazi leader's distinctive moustache and side parting to a picture of Putin's face, the image has been posted onto urinals and printed onto toilet paper.    

Cheeky market stall holders in the pro-European city of Lviv have also printed the image onto T-shirts and bags and all sorts of other paraphernalia.

Melding their names together some of the products feature the phrase 'Putler Kaput,' a clear signal of their hatred towards the Russian president who has backed pro-Moscow separatist rebels in the civil war which has claimed at least 4,300 lives.

More chillingly, some have printed images of Putin with a single, bloody bullet wound through his forehead, while others have printed swastikas onto the Russian flag.

Posters across the city also compare Putins annexation of the overwhelmingly ethnic Russian Crimean peninsula in March, with Hitlers 1938 annexation of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia.

Meanwhile, urinals feature a prominently placed picture of Putin with an expletive underneath to describe him. At gun ranges it is also possible to rent an AK47 and shoot specially-made Putin targets, in the city which sits near the Polish border.

Tension in the east of the country remains high despite a partial ceasefire agreement between Ukrainian forces and separatist rebels which is due to start on December 5.  

Despite the deal brokered by the the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OCSE) Ukraine yesterday said a military convoy of 106 vehicles including Howitzer tanks rolled into its Donetsk region from Russia without permission.  

The truce comes exactly three months after the much violated September 5 ceasefire to end the separatist rebellion which began in April in Luhansk and Donetsk.

(dailymail.co.uk)