Vladimir Putin gets tractor as birthday gift from THIS country's president

Celebrating his 70th birthday, Russian President Vladimir Putin got a Soviet-era tractor, the pride of Belarusian industry, as a gift from Belarus' President Alexander Lukashenko.

Image for representation

Russian President Vladimir Putin celebrated his 70th birthday on Friday and received an unusual birthday present: a tractor. President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus gave Putin a gift card for the car as the leaders of numerous former Soviet states convened in the Konstantin Palace in St. Petersburg, built during the Czarist era. Since the Soviet era, tractors have been the pride of the Belarusian industry. According to Lukashenko, an autocrat who has ruled the former Soviet country with an iron fist for nearly three decades while attempting to project a man of the people image, he used a model similar to the one he gave Putin in his garden.

It was unclear how the Russian president reacted to the present, which was made public by Lukashenko's office. When Putin spoke about the need to address means of resolving disputes between former Soviet countries during his opening statements for the meeting on television, he made no mention of the gift.

He also emphasised the significance of information sharing in the battle against crime, illegal substances, and terrorism. Next week, the leaders of the informal association of former Soviet states, the Commonwealth of Independent States, will meet in Astana, Kazakhstan.

Meanwhile, Putin also received birthday wishes from leaders of other countries as well including the Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov. The birthday wishes came via a video wishing the Russian president 'good health, long life, and successes'. The birthday video included some archived footage with some music in the background.

Addressing Putin in the video, Kadyrov said, "Putin has changed the position of Russia in the world and made it a nation to be reckoned with!" Putin has been looking east in the face of extraordinary sanctions since the start of the Ukraine offensive seven months ago. However, no words of congratulations from Brussels or Washington have been reported by the Kremlin.

With inputs from agencies