Russia to Bulgaria: Please stop making our statues look like this

This is a monument to Soviet soldiers in Bulgaria's capital, Sofia, that vandals/street artists/political commentators have spray-painted to look like a crowd of superheroes.

It's one of many Russian monuments in the former Soviet satellite state that has received the paint treatment - and now Bulgaria's Russian embassy has had enough. It has asked the Bulgarian government to take "exhaustive measures" to prevent similar attacks and track down the culprit, reports the Moscow Times.

Not all the statues are vandalised to look like superheroes: earlier this year artists painted a monument to Soviet troops in the colours of Ukraine's flag, while another was painted pink as part of a "artistic apology" for Bulgaria supporting Soviet troops during Prague's uprising against communism in 1968.

Picture credit: Ignat Ignev / Wikicommons