Putin appoints kickboxing champion as regional head
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday appointed a world champion kickboxer as acting head of a majority Buddhist region in the south of the country.
Batu Khasikov, 38, was appointed to lead the Kalmykia region on the Caspian Sea, the Kremlin said in a statement.
The region’s previous head, Alexei Orlov, resigned voluntarily, it said.
Between 1993 and 2010, the southern region was run by Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, an eccentric chess-mad politician who claimed to have encountered aliens.
Khasikov holds several world and European titles in kickboxing.
He represented Kalmykia as a senator in Russia’s upper house of parliament, the Federation Council, between 2012 and 2014.
He has also worked as a government adviser on youth policy.
In 2016, Khasikov reportedly criticised child mixed martial arts (MMA) fights in Chechnya. The sons of Ramzan Kadyrov, Chechnya’s authoritarian leader, took part in the controversial competition.
The Russian republic, which lies north of the Caucasus on the Caspian Sea, is the world’s westernmost Buddhist region with a population of around 300,000 people.
Putin appointed several new regional heads this week as part of an expected reshuffle.
Separatelty, Russia expressed anger on Wednesday that President Vladimir Putin has not been invited to ceremonies marking the 80th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II in Poland later this year.
The foreign ministry voiced its “bewilderment” upon learning of Warsaw’s plan to mark the anniversary of the start of WWII only with Poland’s close allies -- members of the European Union and Nato and several ex-soviet nations.
Russia accused the Polish authorities of ignoring “historic logic” and seeking to turn the September commemorations into a “secret” meeting.
“Despite our Homeland’s unquestionably decisive contribution to the defeat of Hitler’s Reich and the liberation of Poland from the Nazi aggressors there is no place for Russia in this plan,” the foreign ministry said in a statement.