Putin is given rock star welcome in Dagestan and even poses for kissing selfies ... trends now
Vladimir Putin is consolidating support in Russia following last week's short-lived rebellion by Wagner group chief Yevgeny Prigozhin in a rare meet-and-greet that saw him mobbed by a crowd as he posed for selfies with young girls.
Stunning footage from the event - a presidential appearance during a trip to the city of Derbent in the Dagestan region of southern Russia - showed how he dove into a nighttime crowd like a Hollywood actor at a red carpet show.
Seemingly imbued with fresh energy after averting a small scale civil war last week, the normally stoic and isolated Putin was uncharacteristically personable, shaking hands and planting kisses on the head of a young teenage girl who gushed over him and pleaded with her mother to snap a photo of her with the president.
In another bizarre moment he shakes hands with - and appears to adjust something on the uniform of - an officer carrying what may be his nuclear briefcase.
He has not greeted his security apparatchiks in such a way previously.
The scene was in marked variance to the extreme measures of the last few years which have enforced strict quarantines for anyone outside of Putin's close circle before meeting with him.
His transformative behaviour has led many, including senior Russian figures, to fuel speculation that Putin greeting adoring fans in Dagestan was in fact a body double.
Vladimir Putin took part in a rare meet-and-greet that saw him mobbed by a crowd as he posed for selfies with young girls
Russian president Vladimir Putin is seen snapping a selfie with an adoring teen from Dagestan
The normally stoic and isolated Putin was uncharacteristically personable, shaking hands and planting kisses on the head of a young teenage girl
Putin has not been seen greeting crowds in such a way since before the pandemic
In another bizarre moment he shook hands with - and appeared to adjust something on the uniform of - an officer carrying what may be his nuclear briefcase
It comes as a recent picture of Putin with Chechen republic head Ramzan Kadyrov showed the president appearing bloated with mottled skin.
A longtime Moscow diplomat said today: 'It is getting impossible to believe that there is only one Putin.
'There are several - very good lookalikes, yet they behave somewhat differently.
'This one diving into the crowd in Dagestan behaves differently to the traditional Putin.'
Commentator Viktor Alksnis, a Soviet military tactician and politician who is now a Western-based analyst known as the Black Colonel, said: 'Why is Putin meeting with visitors in the Kremlin after their two-week quarantine and at a great distance, while in
