President Vladimir Putin has traveled to the Chukotka autonomous district, the Kremlin said Wednesday, the first time he has visited Russia's easternmost region during his more than two decades in power.
“The head of state will inspect a year-round greenhouse complex, talk to residents and meet with the governor in the city of Anadyr [the capital of Chukotka],” the Kremlin said in a statement.
Chutkota shares a maritime border with the U.S. state of Alaska, which is located across the Bering Strait.
The last Russian leader to visit Chukotka was former President Dmitry Medvedev in 2008.
Around 100 residents were filmed watching Putin’s motorcade in temperatures of minus 30 degrees Celsius, according to the regional news website 7x7.
The outlet said Chukotka’s administration previously announced Putin’s meeting with a “small circle” of local public figures, entrepreneurs, teachers, doctors and soldiers who fought in Ukraine.
Kremlin pool reporters said Putin drove around the region on an all-terrain vehicle called “Khishchnik” (Russian for “predator”) during the trip, his first this year.
“We’re mastering domestic [goods production],” Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov told state TV reporters as he boarded a “Khishchnik.”
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