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Planes disappear off radar screens, helicopters loaded with gold vanish into the taiga; in the burgeoning criminal world of the former Soviet Union, people are made to disappear regularly. But Belarus went one better this week, when it mislaid its president.
The loss became apparent Wednesday when the Supreme Soviet in Minsk wished to consult President Alexander Lukashenko -- and could not find him. The president had left the country and according to television news reports, no one, not even the presidential press office, could say where he was.
Lukashenko was in fact nursing a bad back at the Russian resort of Sochi on the Black Sea. By Thursday afternoon his press service was able to state this categorically.
"The president went to Sochi for 10 days to take treatment for his spine," and was expected back "within days," a presidential spokeswoman in Minsk said Thursday. She denied that there had been any confusion over his whereabouts, saying "everybody knew."
She also said Lukashenko would be returning directly to Minsk, despite other reports that he would be meeting in Moscow with Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin on Friday. Interfax reported Lukashenko would be joining a delegation led by Belarussian Prime Minister Mikhail Chigir to discuss Russian energy supplies to Belarus.
Chigir's office in Minsk confirmed he was leaving for Moscow on Thursday and would be joined by Lukashenko for talks on Friday. Chernomyrdin's office also confirmed Lukashenko was expected for talks in Moscow on Friday.
Belarus' Moscow embassy may be caught on the hop. A spokeswoman said she did not know the whereabouts of the president but was sure he would not be visiting Moscow in the near future.
Lukashenko, 40, a former army political commissar and collective-farm manager, was elected president of Belarus in July defeating Vyacheslav Kebich, an old-style communist apparatchik.
At a recent press conference in Moscow, Lukashenko tried to show up-to-date openness when he admitted to living with a woman who was not his wife. But when it comes to rest cures, it seems old habits of secrecy die hard.
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