Putin reappears in public

Russian President Vladimir Putin reappeared Monday for the first time in nearly two weeks.

Putin, whose absence from public events has led to speculation about his health, joked that things “would be boring without rumors” at an event with the president of Kyrgyzstan, The New York Times reported.

The Russian leader was last seen in public at a March 5 meeting with the prime minister of Italy. He then canceled meetings in Moscow and a trip to Kyrgyzstan. 

The secretive leader’s disappearance caused some to wonder if he was attempting to hide an illness. But according to reports, he looked healthy at the appearance on Monday.

Kyrgyzstan’s president even went to great lengths to show that Putin was in good health.

“Just now, Vladimir Vladimirovich drove me around the grounds, he was sitting behind the wheel himself,” Almazbek Atambayev said, according to the Times. “This was to dispel the rumors. I often hear different rumors about myself. This isn’t right. That is, the president of Russia not only walks, he races around, he gives guests rides.”

Putin is particularly under the microscope now because of Russia’s intervention in Ukraine, where Western powers have been trying to create a lasting cease-fire between Kiev and pro-Russian separatists.

Putin said in a documentary that aired this weekend that he had considered putting Russia’s nuclear arsenal on alert because of the revolution in Ukraine, which Putin believes was engineered by the West.