Putin to visit Tajikistan this week: spokesman

Russian President Vladimir Putin will travel to Tajikistan on Tuesday, his spokesman said, his first trip abroad since Moscow launched its military operation in Ukraine. 

“A working visit by President Putin is scheduled for tomorrow in Tajikistan,” Dmitry Peskov said on Monday of the visit to the former Soviet republic and Moscow ally. 

Putin is also expected in Turkmenistan on Wednesday for a summit of countries bordering the Caspian Sea.

His last foreign visit dates back to February 4-5, when he travelled to China to meet his counterpart Xi Jinping and attend the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics.

Just over two weeks later, Putin launched his “special military operation” in Ukraine.

Since then the Kremlin leader has not ventured abroad, even to meet close ally Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko. Lukashenko has visited Russia several times.

Takijistan, the poorest of the former Soviet republics, is an ally of Russia and heavily dependent on its neighbour economically.

Because of the Covid-19 pandemic, Putin made only three foreign trips between February 2020 and February 2022.

He met US President Joe Biden in Geneva in June 2021, Indian leader Narendra Modi in New Delhi in December of that year and Xi in Beijing in February 2022.