[kafkaesq]

This seems unnecessarily provocative. Why can't they just restore them to the pre-annexation names (i.e. rolling back the name changes proposed by the Ukrainian parliament)?

That would be the simplest way of saying "We're not playing these games -- with either side of the conflict."

[krymnash1234]

This is what they did. They rolled back to soviet era names, which was exactly what the names were before Ukrainian parliament renames them.

So Crimea had a bunch of Soviet-named cities for these years

[kafkaesq]

OK -- if so, then the article was pretty sloppy for not clarifying that point.