The president of Austria, Alexander van der Bellen, has suffered an unusual mishap during an official visit to Moldova: the dog adopted by the country’s president, Maia Sandu, bit him on the hand.
A video broadcast in Moldovan media showed Van der Bellen standing next to Sandu and Codrut, his rescue dog, during his visit to the capital, Chisinau, on Friday. When the Austrian president leaned down to pet Codrut, the dog briefly bit his hand.
“It was a small wound and was treated with a bandage,” van der Bellen’s office explained to the German agency DPA, adding that “he is fine.”
Van der Bellen met with Sandu and her Slovenian counterpart, Natasa Pirc Musar, to discuss Moldova’s candidacy for the European Union.
The Austrian president mentioned the incident on Friday afternoon on his Instagram profile, acknowledging that it “caused a bit of a stir.”
“Everyone who knows me knows I’m a big dog lover and can understand his nervousness,” van der Bellen said of Codrut. “He was nervous because of all the people around him,” he added.