President Vladimir Putin does not take vacations and sleeps only “a few hours a day,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday.

Asked whether the president planned to rest on his 73rd birthday on Oct. 7, Peskov replied: “No, he simply cannot afford to take a holiday.”

Putin is due to travel to Tajikistan on Oct. 9 for a state visit with President Emomali Rahmon.

“Honestly, sometimes it’s hard for me to understand where he finds so much strength,” Peskov told the state-run TASS news agency. “He is always at the peak of concentration. And he sleeps just a few hours a day, without exaggeration. I cannot understand it either.”

Putin himself has previously said he usually sleeps about six hours a night, sometimes less.

His last publicly known vacation was in 2021, when he twice traveled to Siberia with then-Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

The Kremlin at the time released photographs of the two men hiking in the taiga and fishing. Putin later claimed they camped in a tent where “bears came close.”

Putin has not taken a holiday since launching Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Peskov said last month that the president no longer has “full-fledged” breaks, although he sometimes manages to take a few days off. When his schedule allows, he swims in the Black Sea in Sochi, according to the Kremlin.

Putin occasionally disappears from public view. In November 2024, he was not seen at public events for nearly two weeks, at a time of escalated tensions with the West after Washington authorized Ukraine to use long-range weapons to strike targets inside Russia.

During these periods of asbence, the Kremlin is believed to maintain the appearance of activity by releasing footage of pre-recorded meetings.

(c)THE MOSCOW TIMES 2025