If you were trying to guess what was in the red bag held by the mysterious “lady in red” in Putin’s car (who turned out to be a security officer), now you have your answer, directly from the Patriarch’s press secretary!
“The president arrived driving his car, opened the back door, behind which there was a security service officer (which is logical), holding a red [bag] with an icon inside,” the press secretary, Aleksandr Volkov, wrote on his Facebook page.
“I held this [bag] 10 minutes later myself, so I can assure you that it was a heavy icon, and the president would have hardly been comfortable with carrying it himself to the cathedral,” Volkov added.
His post follows a day of media hype over the “mysterious passenger” that Putin was driving on his trip to the Valaam Orthodox monastery in northwest Russia. The video instantly caused gossip of a possible “woman in a red dress,” who has Putin for a driver and can wave him away as she pleases.
However, the passenger was really a member of Putin’s security staff, according to Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. The president opened the door to “get something” from the back seat, he said, and apparently it was a suit jacket that Putin is later seen wearing.