Putin visits Chechnya for first time in 13 years, meets troops readying to fight Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov on Tuesday inspected Chechen troops and volunteers readying to fight Ukraine, the Kremlin said, in what was Putin’s first trip in 13 years to the North Caucasus republic.

The previously unannounced trip to the mostly Muslim republic that is part of Russia comes as Moscow fights to push Ukrainian forces out of its Kursk region two weeks after they smashed through the border in the largest invasion of Russia since World War Two.

During that trip Putin, who arrived in the republic for the first time since 2011, bowed to the grave of the first leader of Russian Chechnya and the father of the current head of the region Akhmat Kadyrov in his family's ancestral village. 

The president talked with special military operation volunteers at the Russian Special Forces University in Gudermes and inspected the new mosque of the Prophet Isa in Grozny.