Putin buys new motorbike for Alaskan man who complained about sanctions

Telegraph

11 hours ago

Vladimir Putin bought a brand new Russian motorbike for an Alaskan man who said that his own model was becoming impossible to repair because of US sanctions.
Mark Warren was handed the keys to his new Ural motorbike in the car park of an Anchorage hotel, where the Russian delegation was staying during last week's meeting between Putin and Donald Trump.
A Russian state television crew had been milling about on the streets of Anchorage when they stopped to admire Mr Warren's rugged Soviet-era bike.
Mr Warren complained to the reporters from Russia-1 that repairs to his bike were becoming increasingly costly and new parts near-impossible to obtain because of sanctions on Russia. His motorbike was manufactured by Ural, whose original factory was founded in 1941 in what was then Soviet Russia.
'So for you, if they resolve this conflict here in Alaska, I mean Putin and Trump, it will be good?' the reporter, Valentin Bogdanov, asked him. 'Yes, it will be good,' Mr Warren replied.
A few days later, he was handed the keys to a brand new Ural sidecar motorbike.
'I have to say that this is a personal gift from the president of the Russian Federation,' said Andrei Ledenev, an employee at the Russian embassy in Washington, who delivered the gift.
In front of a scrum of Russian state TV cameras, Mr Warren looked stunned as he heard about his new benefactor. Mustering only a few words, he nodded and said: 'Very good.'
In footage splashed across Russian state media, which framed the gift as a symbol of Putin's generosity and goodwill, Mr Warren then hopped aboard his new bike – with Mr Ledenev perched behind him – to take it for a spin.
'Here's a new ride on the new Ural. A Russian vehicle in Russian America under the shadow of a Russian birch tree,' a Russia-1 correspondent commented, referring to Alaska's history as part of the Russian empire.
Mr Warren said: 'Oh, it's night and day. It runs much smoother and is much more enjoyable. I like my old one too, but this one is obviously much better. It's newer, it's more precise in control. I'm speechless, it's amazing. Thank you very much.'
Perhaps unbeknown to him, his story appeared in a segment on the flagship Russian channel about how Western sanctions over Russia's invasion of Ukraine have affected ordinary Americans.
The motorbikes, known for their distinctive sidecars, were initially developed to be used by the Soviet military during the Second World War on the Eastern Front and later adapted for civilian use.
Ural, which is headquartered in Washington State, said that all of its motorbikes were now assembled in Kazakhstan.
The company, which denounced Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, pulled all its production out of Russia in March 2022 after it ground to a halt because of an inability to export bikes out of Russia thanks to sanctions.