Meet the ethnic Russian mayor of Dnipro with a British-made rocket launcher in his private bar

telegraph.co.uk: The mayor of the southeastern Ukrainian city of Dnipro is the kind of gruff ethnic Russian one could imagine admiring Vladimir Putin, had Moscow not just bombed his town.

But while the Russian president is fond of posing shirtless on horseback, shooting tigers with tranquillisers, and invading neighbouring countries, Dnipro mayor Borys Filatov rides motorcycles, keeps the canister for a British-made anti-tank weapon in his bar, and says he is defending LGBT rights against Russian imperialism.

Mr Filatov, 50, is the personification of how Mr Putin dramatically miscalculated his invasion, an example of how Ukraine’s Russian-speaking population confounded Moscow’s calculation that they would welcome – or at least acquiesce to – a reinvigorated Russian empire.

“They don’t understand how a Russian-speaking city – a multiethnic city – can be so motivated to fight against them and how people here can hate Russia so much,” he said, speaking from the offices of his former law practice.

His city of a million people, which straddles the river of the same name, is the capital of a region where Russophobes make up nearly three-quarters of the population. As such it is a key example of how Mr Putin’s plan for a new confederation of pro-Russian republicans in eastern Ukraine has violently backfired, forcing those who might naturally be pro-Russian to align more closely with the West.

A burly man who worked as a journalist, lawyer and businessman before becoming mayor, Mr Filatov relocated the meeting from nearby city council buildings due to an air raid alarm, assuring The Telegraph the location would be safer in the event of further Russian bombardment.

Aside from a small selection of Mr Filatov’s extensive art collection (he claims to be one of the top five collectors of Japanese art in the former Soviet Union), a lone set of dumbbells and a few photos of his motorcycle-riding buddies, his office appeared largely disused.

But in his private bar, Mr Filatov showed off his newest acquisition: the empty carry case for an NLAW anti-tank weapon.

“It’s a symbol of the help we’ve received from our friends,” he said.

The British-made and -supplied shoulder-fired rocket was a key component of a strategy that saw nimble units of Ukrainian fighters harass and destroy Russian columns, blunting the momentum of the initial invasion, which was focused on capturing Kyiv until the Russian withdrawal at the end of March.

The N-LAW’s utility on the battlefield and their plentiful supply has made the UK one of Ukraine’s most popular backers and sent Boris Johnson’s stock soaring at a time when it is plummeting at home.

“Boris Johnson has become a new Winston Churchill to us,” Mr Filatov said. “I think he’s also pursuing his own aims at home – I understand that – but we have to admit that he’s our best friend right now.”

Mr Filatov – who makes occasional trips to London to attend art auctions at Christie's, and whose daughter studied in the UK – says his worldview is Western even if his heritage is Russian.

“I’m Russian, my parents are ethnic Russians, I’m a member of the Russian Orthodox Church, my wife is Russian, my mother was a teacher of Russian literature” he said. “They cannot comprehend how people like me can resist their influence.”

Resisting the invasion

Instead Mr Filatov said the Russian invasion had energised most Russian-speaking Ukrainians to resist the Kremlin's "special military operation" to "denazify" Ukraine.

“Can a normal person share their values?” he asked rhetorically. “If you live in a free country like here and you breathe free air, you cannot understand how they can have all this bullshit in their head like Putin does and to accept this propaganda.”

Instead Mr Filatov said he was fighting for Western values. “The values that we are defending include democratic elections, freedom of press, freedom of speech, and LGBT rights.”

His past published record of speaking out against homophobia suggests this last example was not simply a pre-planned talking point in an interview appealing for more Western military aid to Ukraine.

But with Russian forces regrouping for a renewed offensive likely aimed at seizing the eastern Donbas region, which borders Dnipro, more military aid to Ukraine is Mr Filatov’s primary interest.

In particular he cited the need for offensive weapons such as heavy artillery and aircraft that could enable Ukrainian forces to dislodge Russian forces from captured territory that they are now digging into.

“The three things we need right now from the UK are weapons, weapons and more weapons,” Mr Filatov concluded, paraphrasing Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, who made a similar appeal to allies earlier this month.