Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin (Влади́мир Влади́мирович Пу́тин) (born October 7, 1952) has been the President of Russia since the year 2000.
Putin was born in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg). Graduated from the Law Department of Leningrad State University in 1975. During his KGB officer career from 1975 to 1991 he lived several years in the GDR (Eastern Germany). He was head of the FSB (the KGB's successor) from July 1998 to August 1999. He was Prime Minister in Boris Yeltsin's government from August 1999. As Prime Minister he won great acclaim from the Russian people for managing the reinvasion of the breakaway republic of Chechnya. On December 31, 1999, Yeltsin resigned, and made Putin the second (acting) President of the Russian Federation. Proper Presidential elections were held on March 26, 2000, which Putin won.
In many ways, Putin is a rather atypical Russian leader: He is comparatively young, never touches alcohol, and is a sports enthusiast — he has practiced Judo since childhood. He is a practicing member of the Russian Orthodox Church whose conversion to Christianity most observers agree was sincere. He speaks German and English with near-native fluency. Putin is married and he has two children.
Unlike his predecessor, President Putin has been less enthusiastic about erasing Russia's Soviet past from memory. He has stated his belief that whatever the crimes of the Communist regime, it was nevertheless an important part of Russian history, and an important influence on the creation of modern Russian society. As a result, some Soviet era symbols have been allowed to return to Russia, such as the trademark red military flag, the "Soviet Star" crest, and the Soviet national anthem (although with revised lyrics). In 2004, Putin declared the collapse of the USSR a "national tragedy on an enormous scale."
During his time in office, Putin has attempted to strengthen relations with other members of the CIS. The 'near abroad' zone of traditional Russian influence has again become a foreign policy priority under Putin as the EU and NATO have expanded into territory Moscow controlled for the second half of the last century.
Putin opposed the war in Iraq during the Iraq crisis of 2003. After the war ended, American president George W. Bush asked the United Nations for the lifting of sanctions on Iraq. Putin supported lifting of the sanctions in due course, arguing that first UN commission be given a chance to complete its work on the search of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
The pro-Putin United Russia party won a landslide victory in the 2003 parliamentary elections. Foreign observers called the election itself fair, but noted that the largely government-run Media, especially Russian national TV, had massively and unfairly campaigned for the governing party only.
It is said that there are two factions operating within Putin's Kremlin. One, the siloviki, is associated with the more nationalist elements of the military and security services. The other, tagged the Family, are people linked with former President Boris Yeltsin and the oligarchs who prospered during his term in office. These two factions often fiercely disagree, as they did in relation to the arrest of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the Russian oil magnate. Putin has been careful not to be seen to be with one faction or the other, with his Chief of Staff Alexander Voloshin identified as linked to the Family. It is believed that Voloshin threatened to resign in protest at the arrest of Khodorkovsky. Putin accepted the resignation and replaced him with Dmitry Medvedev, the chairman of Gazprom the state-owned gas company.
Another linked to the Family is former Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov. Defying Putin's direct instruction to avoid involvement in the matter, Kasyanov expressed great concern about the Khodorkovsky prosecution and declared the freezing of a controlling stake in Yukos unprecedented.
On 24 February 2004, less than a month prior to the elections, Putin dismissed prime minister
Mikhail Kasyanov and the entire Russian cabinet and appointed Viktor Khristenko acting prime minister. On March 1, he nominated Mikhail Fradkov for the position.
On March 14, 2004, the Presidential elections were held and Putin won the re-election to the Presidency for his second and final term with 71% of the votes. Again there had been massive campaigning by Russian national TV, but again the election itself was fair. He is not permitted under the Constitution of Russian Federation to run for a third term (following the 2003 parliamentary elections he gained a sufficient majority to change the Constitution, but so far he hasn't announced any intention to do so.)
Supporters of Vladimir Putin have often accused the makers of the Harry Potter films to have deliberately modelled Dobby after the Russian president.
