President of South Ossetia tested positive for COVID before meeting with Putin

South Ossetian President Gagloev's talks with Russian leader Putin have been postponed until a later date.reported PeskovAlan GagloevAlan GagloevAlan Gagloev

The meeting of the President of South Ossetia Alan Gagloev with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin was postponed due to a positive test for coronavirus in the South Ossetian leader, press secretary of the head of state Dmitry Peskov said, RIA Novosti reports.

“A decision was made to postpone to a later date the talks between Vladimir Putin and President of South Ossetia Gagloev, which were planned for Wednesday. Unfortunately, his covid test came back positive,” Peskov said.

The Kremlin representative wished Gagloev a speedy recovery.

The press secretary of the head of South Ossetia, Natalya Bosikova, said that his condition was assessed as stable. Gagloev will be in self-isolation and work remotely.

The leaders' meeting was to take place on February 22. Gagloev was supposed to be in Russia on a working visit. During the talks, the parties planned to discuss the current state and prospects for further development of bilateral cooperation, primarily in the socio-economic sphere.

Gagloev called the condition for a referendum on joining Russia Politics

Putin's meeting with Gagloev was supposed to be the first since the latter's victory in the presidential elections in South Ossetia in the spring of 2022.

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The former president of South Ossetia, Anatoly Bibilov, lost the presidential election to his rival, the head of the opposition Nykhas party, Gagloev. Even during his presidency, Bibilov signed a decree on holding a referendum on the issue of the republic's entry into Russia.

After the election, Gagloev emphasized that the authorities would organize a referendum when they received a signal from Moscow, since the decision should be made by both sides.

The Kremlin, in response to the initiative, noted that they would respect the results of the vote, but noted that Moscow did not participate in this process in any way from a legal point of view. Later, the Kremlin said that it was necessary to finalize the initiative to organize a referendum legally and "think about the wording."

After that, the authorities of South Ossetia announced the suspension of Bibilov's decree on holding a referendum. The representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, called such a move sensible.