Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin uses the odd tussle on the judo mat to burnish his rugged image, but Russian President Dmitry Medvedev likes to display his own sporting prowess in a less macho activity — badminton.
Since Medvedev revealed last month that he would not run for a second term as Russia’s president, he has become the butt of unkind jokes suggesting he is twiddling his thumbs while he waits to hand over his job to Putin, a former president, in March next year.
The launch of Medvedev’s Facebook page last week was seen by some as a sign of him having too much free time on his hands. That impression may have gained ground on Monday after the he used his Kremlin video blog to present an extollment of badminton’s virtues.
Dressed in a sports shirt with a Russian tricolor badge and clutching a racket, Medvedev said the game “develops your physical form, eye co-ordination, accuracy and reactions,” adding: “Those who play badminton well take decisions quickly.”
He also noted that the first man in space, Yury Gagarin, had been a keen player.
The video then showed several clips of the 46-year-old -president and Putin, 59, swatting a shuttlecock back and forth in a large hall, in what could be described as a less than competitive encounter.
While both players looked far from expert, commentators suggested that Putin — as in politics, so in leisure — had the upper hand.
David Nowak, a sports writer with the RIA Novosti agency in Moscow, tweeted: “For an almost 60-year-old Putin’s not bad. But yeah, Medvedev plays like my mum.”
Last week, Russia’s education ministry signed an agreement with the national badminton federation to introduce the game into the physical education curriculum. Medvedev’s clip will be used as the introduction to a series of videos on how to play it.
Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) is to visit Russia next month for a summit of the BRICS bloc of developing economies, Chinese Minister of Foreign Affairs Wang Yi (王毅) said on Thursday, a move that comes as Moscow and Beijing seek to counter the West’s global influence. Xi’s visit to Russia would be his second since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China claims to take a neutral position in the conflict, but it has backed the Kremlin’s contentions that Russia’s action was provoked by the West, and it continues to supply key components needed by Moscow for
Japan scrambled fighter jets after Russian aircraft flew around the archipelago for the first time in five years, Tokyo said yesterday. From Thursday morning to afternoon, the Russian Tu-142 aircraft flew from the sea between Japan and South Korea toward the southern Okinawa region, the Japanese Ministry of Defense said in a statement. They then traveled north over the Pacific Ocean and finished their journey off the northern island of Hokkaido, it added. The planes did not enter Japanese airspace, but flew over an area subject to a territorial dispute between Japan and Russia, a ministry official said. “In response, we mobilized Air Self-Defense
CRITICISM: ‘One has to choose the lesser of two evils,’ Pope Francis said, as he criticized Trump’s anti-immigrant policies and Harris’ pro-choice position Pope Francis on Friday accused both former US president Donald Trump and US Vice President Kamala Harris of being “against life” as he returned to Rome from a 12-day tour of the Asia-Pacific region. The 87-year-old pontiff’s comments on the US presidential hopefuls came as he defied health concerns to connect with believers from the jungle of Papua New Guinea to the skyscrapers of Singapore. It was Francis’ longest trip in duration and distance since becoming head of the world’s nearly 1.4 billion Roman Catholics more than 11 years ago. Despite the marathon visit, he held a long and spirited
China would train thousands of foreign law enforcement officers to see the world order “develop in a more fair, reasonable and efficient direction,” its minister for public security has said. “We will [also] send police consultants to countries in need to conduct training to help them quickly and effectively improve their law enforcement capabilities,” Chinese Minister of Public Security Wang Xiaohong (王小洪) told an annual global security forum. Wang made the announcement in the eastern city of Lianyungang on Monday in front of law enforcement representatives from 122 countries, regions and international organizations such as Interpol. The forum is part of ongoing