More Russia officials urge Putin to resign over invasion of Ukraine

More local Russia officials are urging leader Vladimir Putin to resign more than six months into his invasion of Ukraine, signaling an increasing number of residents disapprove of the ongoing war.

The backlash comes amid Ukraine's military forces in recent days mounting a counter-offensive and retaking territory previously captured by the Russian military, forcing troops to retreat.

"The rhetoric that you and your subordinates are using has been riddled with intolerance and aggression for a long time, which in the end effectively threw our country back into the Cold War era," officials from Moscow's Lomonosovsky district council wrote as translated in a letter to Putin last week with municipal elections scheduled on Sunday.

"Russia has again begun to be feared and hated, we again threaten the whole world with nuclear weapons," they wrote before urging Putin to resign, citing that his views are "hopelessly outdated and hinder the development of Russia."

The letter comes days after officials with the Smolninskoye municipal council urged Putin to be tried for treason. Dmitry Palyuga, a council deputy in Smolninskoye, a district of Putin's hometown of St. Petersburg, shared the resolution last week. 

The Smolninskoye council letter, translated by The Daily Beast, states that the majority of deputies voted in favor of Putin's resignation over alleged high treason for his invasion of Ukraine, which has led to the deaths of Russians and problems in the economy.