Vladimir Putin | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Владимир Путин | |||
_(cropped).jpg) Putin in 2023 | |||
| President of Russia | |||
| Assumed office 7 May 2012 | |||
| Prime Minister | |||
| Preceded by | Dmitry Medvedev | ||
| In office 7 May 2000 – 7 May 2008 Acting: 31 December 1999 – 7 May 2000 | |||
| Prime Minister | |||
| Preceded by | Boris Yeltsin | ||
| Succeeded by | Dmitry Medvedev | ||
| Prime Minister of Russia | |||
| In office 8 May 2008 – 7 May 2012 | |||
| President | Dmitry Medvedev | ||
| First Deputy |
| ||
| Preceded by | Viktor Zubkov | ||
| Succeeded by | Viktor Zubkov (acting) | ||
| In office 9 August 1999 – 7 May 2000 | |||
| President | Boris Yeltsin | ||
| First Deputy |
| ||
| Preceded by | Sergei Stepashin | ||
| Succeeded by | Mikhail Kasyanov | ||
| |||
| Personal details | |||
| Born | Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin 7 October 1952 Leningrad, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union | ||
| Political party | Independent (1991–1995, 2001–2008, 2012–present) | ||
| Other political affiliations |
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| Spouse | [a] | ||
| Children | At least 2, Maria and Katerina[b] | ||
| Relatives | Putin family | ||
| Residence(s) | Novo-Ogaryovo, Moscow | ||
| Alma mater | |||
| Awards | Full list | ||
| Signature |  | ||
| Website | eng | ||
| Military service | |||
| Allegiance |  Soviet Union Russia | ||
| Branch/service | |||
| Years of service |
| ||
| Rank | |||
| Commands | Supreme Commander-in-Chief | ||
| Battles/wars | |||
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|---|---|---|
 | ||
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin[c][d] (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who has been President of Russia since 2012. Putin has held continuous positions as president or prime minister since 1999:[e] as prime minister from 1999 to 2000 and from 2008 to 2012, and as president from 2000 to 2008.[f][7] He is the longest-serving Russian or Soviet leader since Joseph Stalin.
Putin worked as a KGB foreign intelligence officer for 16 years, rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel before resigning in 1991 to begin a political career in Saint Petersburg. In 1996, he moved to Moscow to join the administration of President Boris Yeltsin. He briefly served as the director of the Federal Security Service (FSB) and then as secretary of the Security Council of Russia before being appointed prime minister in August 1999. Following Yeltsin's resignation, Putin became acting president and, in less than four months, was elected to his first term as president. He was subsequently reelected in 2004. Due to constitutional limitations of two consecutive presidential terms, Putin served as prime minister again from 2008 to 2012 under Dmitry Medvedev. He returned to the presidency in 2012, following an election marked by allegations of fraud and protests, and was reelected in 2018. In April 2021, after a referendum, he signed into law constitutional amendments that included one allowing him to run for reelection twice more, potentially extending his presidency to 2036.[8][9]
During Putin's initial presidential tenure, the Russian economy grew on average by seven percent per year,[10] driven by economic reforms and a fivefold increase in the price of oil and gas.[11][12] Additionally, Putin led Russia in a conflict against Chechen separatists, reestablishing federal control over the region.[13][14] While serving as prime minister under Medvedev, he oversaw a military conflict with Georgia and enacted military and police reforms. In his third presidential term, Russia annexed Crimea and supported a war in eastern Ukraine through several military incursions, resulting in international sanctions and a financial crisis in Russia. He also ordered a military intervention in Syria to support his ally Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian civil war, ultimately securing permanent naval bases in the Eastern Mediterranean.[15][16][17] In his fourth presidential term, he launched a significant invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, which prompted international condemnation and led to expanded sanctions. In September 2022, he announced a partial mobilization and forcibly annexed four Ukrainian oblasts into Russia. In March 2023, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin for war crimes[18] related to his alleged criminal responsibility for illegal child abductions during the war.[19]
Under Putin's leadership, Russia has undergone democratic backsliding and a shift towards authoritarianism. His rule has been marked by endemic corruption and widespread human rights violations, including the imprisonment and suppression of political opponents, intimidation and censorship of independent media in Russia, and a lack of free and fair elections.[20][21][22] Putin's Russia has consistently received low scores on Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index, The Economist Democracy Index, Freedom House's Freedom in the World index, and the Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom Index. Putin is the longest-serving Russian president and the second-longest-serving European president, following Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus.
Early life
Putin was born on 7 October 1952 in Leningrad, Soviet Union (now Saint Petersburg, Russia),[23] the youngest of three children of Vladimir Spiridonovich Putin (1911–1999) and Maria Ivanovna Putina (née Shelomova; 1911–1998). His grandfather, Spiridon Putin (1879–1965), was a personal cook to Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin.[24][25] Putin's birth was preceded by the deaths of two brothers: Albert, born in the 1930s, died in infancy, and Viktor, born in 1940, died of diphtheria and starvation in 1942 during the Siege of Leningrad by Nazi Germany's forces in World War II.[26][27]
Putin's mother was a factory worker, and his father was a conscript in the Soviet Navy, serving in the submarine fleet in the early 1930s. During the early stage of Nazi German invasion of the Soviet Union, his father served in the destruction battalion of the NKVD.[28][29][30] Later, he was transferred to the regular army and was severely wounded in 1942.[31] Putin's maternal grandmother was killed by the German occupiers of Tver region in 1941, and his maternal uncles disappeared on the Eastern Front during World War II.[32]
Education
On 1 September 1960, Putin started at School No. 193 at Baskov Lane, near his home. He was one of a few in his class of about 45 pupils who were not yet members of the Young Pioneer organization. At the age of 12, he began to practise sambo and judo.[33] In his free time, he enjoyed reading the works of Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, and Lenin.[34] Putin studied German at Saint Petersburg High School 281 and speaks both German and English as additional languages.[35]
Putin studied law at the Leningrad State University named after Andrei Zhdanov (now Saint Petersburg State University) in 1970 and graduated in 1975.[36] His thesis was on "The Most Favored Nation Trading Principle in International Law".[37] While there, he was required to join the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU); he remained a member until it ceased to exist in 1991.[38] Putin met Anatoly Sobchak, an assistant professor who taught business law,[g] and who later became the co-author of the Russian constitution and of corruption schemes in France. Putin was influential in Sobchak's career in Saint Petersburg, and Sobchak was influential in Putin's career in Moscow.[39]
In 1997, he received a degree in economics (kandidat ekonomicheskikh nauk) at the Saint Petersburg Mining University for a thesis on energy dependencies and their instrumentalisation in foreign policy.[40][41] His supervisor was Vladimir Litvinenko, who in 2000 and again in 2004 managed his presidential election campaigns in St Petersburg.[42] Danchenko and Gaddy[who?]consider Putin to be a plagiarist according to Western standards. One book from which he copied entire paragraphs is the Russian-language edition of King and Cleland's Strategic Planning and Policy (1978).[42] Balzer wrote on the Putin thesis and Russian energy policy and concludes along with Olcott that "The primacy of the Russian state in the country’s energy sector is non-negotiable", and cites the insistence on majority Russian ownership of any joint-venture, particularly since BASF signed the Gazprom Nord Stream-Yuzhno-Russkoye deal in 2004 with a 49-51 structure, as opposed to the older 50-50 split of British Petroleum's TNK-BP project.[43]
KGB career
In 1975, Putin joined the KGB and trained at the 401st KGB School in Okhta, Leningrad.[44][45] After training, he worked in the Second Chief Directorate (counterintelligence), before he was transferred to the First Chief Directorate, where he monitored foreigners and consular officials in Leningrad.[44][46][47] In September 1984, Putin was sent to Moscow for further training at the Yuri Andropov Red Banner Institute.[48][49][50]
Multiple reports have suggested Putin was sent by the KGB to New Zealand, corroborated through New Zealand eyewitness accounts and government records. This has never been confirmed by Russian security services. Former Waitākere City mayor Bob Harvey and former prime minister David Lange alleged that Putin served in Wellington and Auckland.[51] He allegedly worked for some time undercover as a Bata shoe salesman in central Wellington.[51][52][53]
From 1985 to 1990, he served in Dresden, East Germany,[54] using a cover identity as a translator.[55] While posted in Dresden, Putin worked as one of the KGB's liaison officers to the Stasi secret police and was reportedly promoted to lieutenant colonel. According to the official Kremlin presidential site, the East German communist regime commended Putin with a bronze medal for "faithful service to the National People's Army". Putin has publicly conveyed delight over his activities in Dresden, once recounting his confrontations with anti-communist protestors of 1989 who attempted the occupation of Stasi buildings in the city.[56]
"Putin and his colleagues were reduced mainly to collecting press clippings, thus contributing to the mountains of useless information produced by the KGB", Russian-American Masha Gessen wrote in their 2012 biography of Putin.[55] His work was also downplayed by former Stasi spy chief Markus Wolf and Putin's former KGB colleague Vladimir Usoltsev. Journalist Catherine Belton wrote in 2020 that this downplaying was actually cover for Putin's involvement in KGB coordination and support for the terrorist Red Army Faction, whose members frequently hid in East Germany with the support of the Stasi. Dresden was preferred as a "marginal" town with only a small presence of Western intelligence services.[57] According to an anonymous source who claimed to be a former RAF member, at one of these meetings in Dresden the militants presented Putin with a list of weapons that were later delivered to the RAF in West Germany. Klaus Zuchold, who claimed to be recruited by Putin, said that Putin handled a neo-Nazi, Rainer Sonntag, and attempted to recruit an author of a study on poisons.[57] Putin reportedly met Germans to be recruited for wireless communications affairs together with an interpreter. He was involved in wireless communications technologies in South-East Asia due to trips of German engineers, recruited by him, there and to the West.[47] However, a 2023 investigation by Der Spiegel reported that the anonymous source had never been an RAF member and "considered a notorious fabulist" with "several previous convictions, including for making false statements."[58]
According to Putin's official biography, during the fall of the Berlin Wall that began on 9 November 1989, he saved the files of the Soviet Cultural Center (House of Friendship) and of the KGB villa in Dresden for the official authorities of the would-be united Germany to prevent demonstrators, including KGB and Stasi agents, from obtaining and destroying them. He then supposedly burnt only the KGB files, in a few hours, but saved the archives of the Soviet Cultural Center for the German authorities. Nothing is told about the selection criteria during this burning; for example, concerning Stasi files or about files of other agencies of the German Democratic Republic or of the USSR. He explained that many documents were left to Germany only because the furnace burst but many documents of the KGB villa were sent to Moscow.[60]
After the collapse of the Communist East German government, Putin was to resign from active KGB service because of suspicions aroused regarding his loyalty during demonstrations in Dresden and earlier, though the KGB and the Soviet Army still operated in eastern Germany. He returned to Leningrad in early 1990 as a member of the "active reserves", where he worked for about three months with the International Affairs section of Leningrad State University, reporting to Vice-Rector Yuriy Molchanov, while working on his doctoral dissertation.[47]
There, he looked for new KGB recruits, watched the student body, and renewed his friendship with his former professor, Anatoly Sobchak, soon to be the Mayor of Leningrad.[61] Putin claims that he resigned with the rank of lieutenant colonel on 20 August 1991,[61] on the second day of the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt against Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev.[62] Putin said: "As soon as the coup began, I immediately decided which side I was on", although he noted that the choice was hard because he had spent the best part of his life with "the organs".[63]
Political career
1990–1996: Saint Petersburg administration
In May 1990, Putin was appointed as an advisor on international affairs to the mayor of Leningrad Anatoly Sobchak. In a 2017 interview with Oliver Stone, Putin said that he resigned from the KGB in 1991, following the coup against Mikhail Gorbachev, as he did not agree with what had happened and did not want to be part of the intelligence in the new administration.[64] According to Putin's statements in 2018 and 2021, he may have worked as a private taxi driver to earn extra money, or considered such a job.[65][66]
On 28 June 1991, he became head of the Committee for External Relations of the Mayor's Office, with responsibility for promoting international relations and foreign investments[68] and registering business ventures. Within a year, Putin was investigated by the city legislative council led by Marina Salye. It was concluded that he had understated prices and permitted the export of metals valued at $93 million in exchange for foreign food aid that never arrived.[69][36] Despite the investigators' recommendation that Putin be fired, Putin remained head of the Committee for External Relations until 1996.[70][71] From 1994 to 1996, he held several other political and governmental positions in Saint Petersburg.
In March 1994, Putin was appointed as first deputy chairman of the Government of Saint Petersburg. In May 1995, he organized the Saint Petersburg branch of the pro-government Our Home – Russia political party, the liberal party of power founded by Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin. In 1995, he managed the legislative election campaign for that party, and from 1995 through June 1997, he was the leader of its Saint Petersburg branch.
1996–1999: Early Moscow career
In June 1996, Sobchak lost his bid for re-election in Saint Petersburg, and Putin, who had led his election campaign, resigned from his positions in the city administration. He moved to Moscow and was appointed as deputy chief of the Presidential Property Management Department headed by Pavel Borodin. He occupied this position until March 1997. He was responsible for the foreign property of the state and organized the transfer of the former assets of the Soviet Union and the CPSU to the Russian Federation.[39]
On 26 March 1997, President Boris Yeltsin appointed Putin deputy chief of the Presidential Staff, a post which he retained until May 1998, and chief of the Main Control Directorate of the Presidential Property Management Department (until June 1998). His predecessor in this position was Alexei Kudrin and his successor was Nikolai Patrushev, both future prominent politicians and Putin's associates.[39] On 3 April 1997, Putin was promoted to 1st class Active State Councillor of the Russian Federation — the highest federal state civilian service rank.[72]
On 27 June 1997, at the Saint Petersburg Mining Institute, guided by rector Vladimir Litvinenko, Putin defended his Candidate of Science dissertation in economics, titled Strategic Planning of the Reproduction of the Mineral Resource Base of a Region under Conditions of the Formation of Market Relations.[73] This exemplified the custom in Russia whereby a young rising official would write a scholarly work in mid-career.[74] Putin's thesis was plagiarized.[75] Fellows at the Brookings Institution found that 15 pages were copied from an American textbook.[76][77]
On 25 May 1998, Putin was appointed First Deputy Chief of the Presidential Staff for the regions, in succession to Viktoriya Mitina. On 15 July, he was appointed head of the commission for the preparation of agreements on the delimitation of the power of the regions and head of the federal center attached to the president, replacing Sergey Shakhray. After Putin's appointment, the commission completed no such agreements, although during Shakhray's term as the head of the Commission 46 such agreements had been signed.[78] Later, after becoming president, Putin cancelled all 46 agreements.[39] On 25 July 1998, Yeltsin appointed Putin director of the Federal Security Service (FSB), the primary intelligence and security organization of the Russian Federation and the successor to the KGB.[79] In 1999, Putin described communism as "a blind alley, far away from the mainstream of civilization".[80]
1999: First premiership
On 9 August 1999, Putin was appointed one of three first deputy prime ministers, and later on that day, was appointed acting prime minister of the Government of the Russian Federation by President Yeltsin.[81] Yeltsin also announced that he wanted to see Putin as his successor. Later on that same day, Putin agreed to run for the presidency.[82]
On 16 August, the State Duma approved his appointment as prime minister with 233 votes in favor (vs. 84 against, 17 abstained),[83] while a simple majority of 226 was required, making him Russia's fifth prime minister in fewer than eighteen months. On his appointment, few expected Putin, virtually unknown to the general public, to last any longer than his predecessors. He was initially regarded as a Yeltsin loyalist; like other prime ministers of Boris Yeltsin, Putin did not choose ministers himself, his cabinet was determined by the presidential administration.[84]
Yeltsin's main opponents and would-be successors were already campaigning to replace the ailing president, and they fought hard to prevent Putin's emergence as a potential successor. Following the September 1999 Russian apartment bombings and the invasion of Dagestan by mujahideen, including the former KGB agents, based in the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, Putin's law-and-order image and unrelenting approach to the Second Chechen War soon combined to raise his popularity and allowed him to overtake his rivals.
While not formally associated with any party, Putin pledged his support to the newly formed Unity Party,[85] which won the second largest percentage of the popular vote (23.3%) in the December 1999 Duma elections, and in turn supported Putin.
1999–2000: Acting presidency
On 31 December 1999, Yeltsin unexpectedly resigned and, according to the Constitution of Russia, Putin became Acting President of the Russian Federation. On assuming this role, Putin went on a previously scheduled visit to Russian troops in Chechnya.[86]
The first presidential decree that Putin signed on 31 December 1999 was titled "On guarantees for the former president of the Russian Federation and the members of his family".[87][88] This ensured that "corruption charges against the outgoing President and his relatives" would not be pursued.[89] This was most notably targeted at the Mabetex bribery case in which Yeltsin's family members were involved. On 30 August 2000, a criminal investigation (number 18/238278-95) in which Putin himself,[90][91] as a member of the Saint Petersburg city government, was one of the suspects, was dropped.
On 30 December 2000, yet another case against the prosecutor general was dropped "for lack of evidence", despite thousands of documents having been forwarded by Swiss prosecutors.[92] On 12 February 2001, Putin signed a similar federal law which replaced the decree of 1999. A case regarding Putin's alleged corruption in metal exports from 1992 was brought back by Marina Salye, but she was silenced and forced to leave Saint Petersburg.[93]
While his opponents had been preparing for an election in June 2000, Yeltsin's resignation resulted in the presidential elections being held on 26 March 2000; Putin won in the first round with 53% of the vote.[94][95]
2000–2004: First presidential term
The inauguration of President Putin occurred on 7 May 2000. He appointed the minister of finance, Mikhail Kasyanov, as prime minister.[96] The first major challenge to Putin's popularity came in August 2000, when he was criticized for the alleged mishandling of the Kursk submarine disaster.[97] That criticism was largely because it took several days for Putin to return from vacation, and several more before he visited the scene.[97]
Between 2000 and 2004, Putin set about the reconstruction of the impoverished condition of the country, apparently winning a power-struggle with the Russian oligarchs, reaching a 'grand bargain' with them. This bargain allowed the oligarchs to maintain most of their powers, in exchange for their explicit support for—and alignment with—Putin's government.[98][99]
The Moscow theater hostage crisis occurred in October 2002. Many in the Russian press and in the international media warned that the deaths of 130 hostages in the special forces' rescue operation during the crisis would severely damage President Putin's popularity. However, shortly after the siege had ended, the Russian president enjoyed record public approval ratings—83% of Russians declared themselves satisfied with Putin and his handling of the siege.[100]
In 2003, a referendum was held in Chechnya, adopting a new constitution which declares that the Republic of Chechnya is a part of Russia; on the other hand, the region did acquire autonomy.[101] Chechnya has been gradually stabilized with the establishment of the Parliamentary elections and a Regional Government.[102][103] Throughout the Second Chechen War, Russia severely disabled the Chechen rebel movement; however, sporadic attacks by rebels continued to occur throughout the northern Caucasus.[104]
ICC arrest warrant
On 17 March 2023, the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for Putin's arrest,[320][321][322][323] alleging that Putin held criminal responsibility in the illegal deportation and transfer of children from Ukraine to Russia during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.[324][325][326]
It was the first time that the ICC had issued an arrest warrant for the head of state of one of the five Permanent Members of the United Nations Security Council,[320] (the world's five principal nuclear powers).[327]
The ICC simultaneously issued an arrest warrant for Maria Lvova-Belova, Commissioner for Children's Rights in the Office of the President of the Russian Federation. Both are charged with:
- ...the war crime of unlawful deportation of population (children) and that of unlawful transfer of population (children) from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation,...[322]
...for their publicized program, since 24 February 2022, of forced deportations of thousands of unaccompanied Ukrainian children to Russia, from areas of eastern Ukraine under Russian control.[320][322] Russia has maintained that the deportations were humanitarian efforts to protect orphans and other children abandoned in the conflict region.[320]
2023 Wagner rebellion
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On 23 June 2023, the Wagner Group, a Russian paramilitary organization, rebelled against the government of Russia. The revolt arose amidst escalating tensions between the Russian Ministry of Defense and Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of Wagner.[328]
Prigozhin portrayed the rebellion as a response to an alleged attack on his forces by the ministry.[329][330] He dismissed the government's justification for invading Ukraine,[331] blamed Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu for the country's military shortcomings,[332] and accused him of waging the war for the benefit of Russian oligarchs.[333][334] In a televised address on 24 June, Russian president Vladimir Putin denounced Wagner's actions as treason and pledged to quell the rebellion.[330][335]
Prigozhin's forces seized control of Rostov-on-Don and the Southern Military District headquarters and advanced towards Moscow in an armored column.[336] Following negotiations with Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko,[337] Prigozhin agreed to stand down[338] and, late on 24 June, began withdrawing from Rostov-on-Don.[339]
On 23 August 2023, exactly two months after the rebellion, Prigozhin was killed along with nine other people when a business jet crashed in Tver Oblast, north of Moscow.[340] Western intelligence reported that the crash was likely caused by an explosion on board, and it is widely suspected that the Russian state were involved.[341]
Domestic policies
Putin's domestic policies, particularly early in his first presidency, were aimed at creating a vertical power structure. On 13 May 2000, he issued a decree organizing the 89 federal subjects of Russia into seven administrative federal districts and appointed a presidential envoy responsible for each of those districts (whose official title is Plenipotentiary Representative).[342]
According to Stephen White, under the presidency of Putin, Russia made it clear that it had no intention of establishing a "second edition" of the American or British political system, but rather a system that was closer to Russia's own traditions and circumstances.[343] Some commentators have described Putin's administration as a "sovereign democracy".[344][345][346] According to the proponents of that description (primarily Vladislav Surkov), the government's actions and policies ought above all to enjoy popular support within Russia itself and not be directed or influenced from outside the country.[347]
The practice of the system is characterized by Swedish economist Anders Åslund as manual management, commenting: "After Putin resumed the presidency in 2012, his rule is best described as 'manual management' as the Russians like to put it. Putin does whatever he wants, with little consideration to the consequences with one important caveat. During the Russian financial crash of August 1998, Putin learned that financial crises are politically destabilizing and must be avoided at all costs. Therefore, he cares about financial stability."[348]
The period after 2012 saw mass protests against the falsification of elections, censorship and toughening of free assembly laws. In July 2000, according to a law proposed by Putin and approved by the Federal Assembly of Russia, Putin gained the right to dismiss the heads of the 89 federal subjects. In 2004, the direct election of those heads (usually called "governors") by popular vote was replaced with a system whereby they would be nominated by the president and approved or disapproved by regional legislatures.[349][350]
This was seen by Putin as a necessary move to stop separatist tendencies and get rid of those governors who were connected with organised crime.[351] This and other government actions effected under Putin's presidency have been criticized by many independent Russian media outlets and Western commentators as anti-democratic.[352][353]
During his first term in office, Putin opposed some of the Yeltsin-era business oligarchs, as well as his political opponents, resulting in the exile or imprisonment of such people as Boris Berezovsky, Vladimir Gusinsky, and Mikhail Khodorkovsky; other oligarchs such as Roman Abramovich and Arkady Rotenberg are friends and allies with Putin.[354] Putin succeeded in codifying land law and tax law and promulgated new codes on labor, administrative, criminal, commercial and civil procedural law.[355] Under Medvedev's presidency, Putin's government implemented some key reforms in the area of state security, the Russian police reform and the Russian military reform.[356]
Economic, industrial, and energy policies
Sergey Guriyev, when talking about Putin's economic policy, divided it into four distinct periods: the "reform" years of his first term (1999–2003); the "statist" years of his second term (2004 – the first half of 2008); the world economic crisis and recovery (the second half of 2008–2013); and the Russo-Ukrainian War, Russia's growing isolation from the global economy, and stagnation (2014–present).[357]
In 2000, Putin launched the "Programme for the Socio-Economic Development of the Russian Federation for the Period 2000–2010", but it was abandoned in 2008 when it was 30% complete.[358] Fueled by the 2000s commodities boom including record-high oil prices,[11][12] under the Putin administration from 2000 to 2016, an increase in income in USD terms was 4.5 times.[359] During Putin's first eight years in office, industry grew substantially, as did production, construction, real incomes, credit, and the middle class.[360][361] A fund for oil revenue allowed Russia to repay Soviet Union's debts by 2005. Russia joined the World Trade Organization in August 2012.[362]
In 2006, Putin launched an industry consolidation programme to bring the main aircraft-producing companies under a single umbrella organization, the United Aircraft Corporation (UAC).[363][364] In September 2020, the UAC general director announced that the UAC will receive the largest-ever post-Soviet government support package for the aircraft industry in order to pay and renegotiate the debt.[365][366]
In 2014, Putin signed a deal to supply China with 38 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year. Power of Siberia, which Putin has called the "world's biggest construction project", was launched in 2019 and is expected to continue for 30 years at an ultimate cost to China of $400bn.[368] The ongoing financial crisis began in the second half of 2014 when the Russian ruble collapsed due to a decline in the price of oil and international sanctions against Russia. These events in turn led to loss of investor confidence and capital flight, though it has also been argued that the sanctions had little to no effect on Russia's economy.[369][370][371] In 2014, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project named Putin their Person of the Year for furthering corruption and organized crime.[372][373]
According to Meduza, Putin has since 2007 predicted on a number of occasions that Russia will become one of the world's five largest economies. In 2013, he said Russia was one of the five biggest economies in terms of gross domestic product but still lagged behind other countries on indicators such as labour productivity.[374]
Environmental policy
In 2004, Putin signed the Kyoto Protocol treaty designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.[375] However, Russia did not face mandatory cuts, because the Kyoto Protocol limits emissions to a percentage increase or decrease from 1990 levels and Russia's greenhouse-gas emissions fell well below the 1990 baseline due to a drop in economic output after the breakup of the Soviet Union.[376]
Religious policy
Putin regularly attends the most important services of the Russian Orthodox Church on the main holy days and has established a good relationship with Patriarchs of the Russian Church, the late Alexy II of Moscow and the current Kirill of Moscow. As president, Putin took an active personal part in promoting the Act of Canonical Communion with the Moscow Patriarchate, signed 17 May 2007, which restored relations between the Moscow-based Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia after the 80-year schism.[377]
Under Putin, the Hasidic Federation of Jewish Communities of Russia became increasingly influential within the Jewish community, partly due to the influence of Federation-supporting businessmen mediated through their alliances with Putin, notably Lev Leviev and Roman Abramovich.[378][379] According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Putin is popular amongst the Russian Jewish community, who see him as a force for stability. Russia's chief rabbi, Berel Lazar, said Putin "paid great attention to the needs of our community and related to us with a deep respect".[380] In 2016, Ronald S. Lauder, the president of the World Jewish Congress, also praised Putin for making Russia "a country where Jews are welcome".[381]
Human rights organizations and religious freedom advocates have criticized the state of religious freedom in Russia.[382] In 2016, Putin oversaw the passage of legislation that prohibited missionary activity in Russia.[382] Nonviolent religious minority groups have been repressed under anti-extremism laws, especially Jehovah's Witnesses.[383]
One of the 2020 amendments to the Constitution of Russia has a constitutional reference to God.[384]
Human rights policy
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New York City-based NGO Human Rights Watch, in a report entitled Laws of Attrition, authored by Hugh Williamson, the British director of HRW's Europe & Central Asia Division, has claimed that since May 2012, when Putin was reelected as president, Russia has enacted many restrictive laws, started inspections of non-governmental organizations, harassed, intimidated and imprisoned political activists, and started to restrict critics. The new laws include the "foreign agents" law, which is widely regarded as over-broad by including Russian human rights organizations which receive some international grant funding, the treason law, and the assembly law which penalizes many expressions of dissent.[394][395] Human rights activists have criticized Russia for censoring speech of LGBT activists due to "the gay propaganda law"[396] and increasing violence against LGBT+ people due to the law.[397][398][399]
In 2020, Putin signed a law on labelling individuals and organizations receiving funding from abroad as "foreign agents". The law is an expansion of "foreign agent" legislation adopted in 2012.[400][401]
As of June 2020, per Memorial Human Rights Center, there were 380 political prisoners in Russia, including 63 individuals prosecuted, directly or indirectly, for political activities (including Alexey Navalny) and 245 prosecuted for their involvement with one of the Muslim organizations that are banned in Russia. 78 individuals on the list, i.e., more than 20% of the total, are residents of Crimea.[402][403] As of December 2022, more than 4,000 people were prosecuted for criticizing the war in Ukraine under Russia's war censorship laws.[404]
The media
Scott Gehlbach, a professor of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, has claimed that since 1999, Putin has systematically punished journalists who challenge his official point of view.[406] Maria Lipman, an American writing in Foreign Affairs claims, "The crackdown that followed Putin's return to the Kremlin in 2012 extended to the liberal media, which had until then been allowed to operate fairly independently."[407] The Internet has attracted Putin's attention because his critics have tried to use it to challenge his control of information.[408] Marian K. Leighton, who worked for the CIA as a Soviet analyst in the 1980s says, "Having muzzled Russia's print and broadcast media, Putin focused his energies on the Internet."[409]
Robert W. Orttung and Christopher Walker reported that "Reporters Without Borders, for instance, ranked Russia 148 in its 2013 list of 179 countries in terms of freedom of the press. It particularly criticized Russia for the crackdown on the political opposition and the failure of the authorities to vigorously pursue and bring to justice criminals who have murdered journalists. Freedom House ranks Russian media as "not free", indicating that basic safeguards and guarantees for journalists and media enterprises are absent."[410] About two-thirds of Russians use television as their primary source of daily news.[411]
In the early 2000s, Putin and his circle began promoting the idea in Russian media that they are the modern-day version of the 17th-century Romanov tsars who ended Russia's "Time of Troubles", meaning they claim to be the peacemakers and stabilizers after the fall of the Soviet Union.[412]
Promoting conservatism
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Putin has promoted explicitly conservative policies in social, cultural, and political matters, both at home and abroad. Putin has attacked globalism and neoliberalism and is identified by scholars with Russian conservatism.[413] Putin has promoted new think tanks that bring together like-minded intellectuals and writers. For example, the Izborsky Club, founded in 2012 by the conservative right-wing journalist Alexander Prokhanov, stresses (i) Russian nationalism, (ii) the restoration of Russia's historical greatness, and (iii) systematic opposition to liberal ideas and policies.[414] Vladislav Surkov, a senior government official, has been one of the key economics consultants during Putin's presidency.[415]
In cultural and social affairs Putin has collaborated closely with the Russian Orthodox Church. Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, head of the Church, endorsed his election in 2012 stating Putin's terms were like "a miracle of God."[416] Steven Myers reports, "The church, once heavily repressed, had emerged from the Soviet collapse as one of the most respected institutions... Now Kiril led the faithful directly into an alliance with the state."[417]
Mark Woods, a Baptist Union of Great Britain minister and contributing editor to Christian Today, provides specific examples of how the Church has backed the expansion of Russian power into Crimea and eastern Ukraine.[418] Some Russian Orthodox believers consider Putin a corrupt and brutal strongman or even a tyrant. Others do not admire him but appreciate that he aggravates their political opponents. Still others appreciate that Putin defends some although not all Orthodox teachings, whether or not he believes in them himself.[419]
On abortion, Putin stated: "In the modern world, the decision is up to the woman herself."[420] This put him at odds with the Russian Orthodox Church.[421] In 2020, he supported efforts to reduce the number of abortions instead of prohibiting it.[422] On 28 November 2023, during a speech to the World Russian People's Council, Putin urged Russian women to have "seven, eight, or even more children" and said "large families must become the norm, a way of life for all of Russia's people".[423]
Putin supported the 2020 Russian constitutional referendum, which passed and defined marriage as a relationship between one man and one woman in the Constitution of Russia.[424][425][426]
International sporting events
In 2007, Putin led a successful effort on behalf of Sochi for the 2014 Winter Olympics and the 2014 Winter Paralympics,[427] the first Winter Olympic Games to ever be hosted by Russia. In 2008, the city of Kazan won the bid for the 2013 Summer Universiade; on 2 December 2010, Russia won the right to host the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup and 2018 FIFA World Cup, also for the first time in Russian history. In 2013, Putin stated that gay athletes would not face any discrimination at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.[428]
Foreign policy
Generally, Putin's tenure experiences tensions with the west.[429][430] Anna Borshchevskaya, in her 2022 book, summarizes Putin main foreign policy objectives as originating in his 30 December 1999 document which appeared on the government's website, "Russia at the Turn of the Millenium".[431] She presents Putin as orienting himself to the plan that "Russia is a country with unique values in danger of losing its unity—which... is a historic Russian fear. This again points to the fundamental issue of Russia's identity issues—and how the state had manipulated these to drive anti-Western security narratives with the aim of eroding the US-led global order... Moreover, a look at Russia's distribution of forces over the years under Putin has been heavily weighted towards the south (Syria, Ukraine, Middle East), another indicator of the Kremlin's threat perceptions."[432][433]
Leonid Bershidsky analyzed Putin's interview with the Financial Times and concluded, "Putin is an imperialist of the old Soviet school, rather than a nationalist or a racist, and he has cooperated with, and promoted, people who are known to be gay."[434] Putin spoke favorably of artificial intelligence in regards to foreign policy, "Artificial intelligence is the future, not only for Russia, but for all humankind. It comes with colossal opportunities, but also threats that are difficult to predict. Whoever becomes the leader in this sphere will become the ruler of the world."[435]
Post-Soviet states
- Armenia
- Azerbaijan
- Belarus
- Estonia
- Georgia
- Kazakhstan
- Kyrgyzstan
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- Moldova
- Russia
- Tajikistan
- Turkmenistan
- Ukraine
- Uzbekistan
Under Putin, the Kremlin has consistently stated that Russia has a sphere of influence and "privileged interests" over other Post-Soviet states, which are referred to as the "near abroad" in Russia. It has also been stated that the post-Soviet states are strategically vital to Russian interests.[459] Some Russia experts have compared this concept to the Monroe Doctrine.[460]
A series of so-called colour revolutions in the post-Soviet states, namely the Rose Revolution in Georgia in 2003, the Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2004 and the Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan in 2005, led to frictions in the relations of those countries with Russia. In December 2004, Putin criticized the Rose and Orange revolutions, saying: "If you have permanent revolutions you risk plunging the post-Soviet space into endless conflict".[461]
Putin allegedly declared at a NATO-Russia summit in 2008 that if Ukraine joined NATO Russia could contend to annex the Ukrainian East and Crimea.[462] At the summit, he told U.S. President George W. Bush that "Ukraine is not even a state!" while the following year Putin referred to Ukraine as "Little Russia".[463] Following the Revolution of Dignity in March 2014, the Russian Federation annexed Crimea.[464][465][466] According to Putin, this was done because "Crimea has always been and remains an inseparable part of Russia".[467]
After the Russian annexation of Crimea, he said that Ukraine includes "regions of Russia's historic south" and "was created on a whim by the Bolsheviks".[468] He went on to declare that the February 2014 ousting of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych had been orchestrated by the West as an attempt to weaken Russia. "Our Western partners have crossed a line. They behaved rudely, irresponsibly and unprofessionally," he said, adding that the people who had come to power in Ukraine were "nationalists, neo-Nazis, Russophobes and anti-Semites".[468]
In a July 2014 speech during a Russian-supported armed insurgency in Eastern Ukraine, Putin stated he would use Russia's "entire arsenal of available means" up to "operations under international humanitarian law and the right of self-defence" to protect Russian speakers outside Russia.[469][470] With the attainment of autocephaly by the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in December 2018 and subsequent schism of the Russian Orthodox Church from Constantinople, a number of experts came to the conclusion that Putin's policy of forceful engagement in post-Soviet republics significantly backfired on him, leading to a situation where he "annexed Crimea, but lost Ukraine", and provoked a much more cautious approach to Russia among other post-Soviet countries.[471][472]
In late August 2014, Putin stated: "People who have their own views on history and the history of our country may argue with me, but it seems to me that the Russian and Ukrainian peoples are practically one people".[473] After making a similar statement, in late December 2015 he stated: "the Ukrainian culture, as well as Ukrainian literature, surely has a source of its own".[474] In July 2021, he published a lengthy article On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians[475] revisiting these themes, and saying the formation of a Ukrainian state hostile to Moscow was "comparable in its consequences to the use of weapons of mass destruction against us",[476][477]—it was made mandatory reading for military-political training in the Russian Armed Forces.[478]
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In August 2008, Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili attempted to restore control over the breakaway South Ossetia. However, the Georgian military was soon defeated in the resulting 2008 South Ossetia War after regular Russian forces entered South Ossetia and then other parts of Georgia, then also opened a second front in the other Georgian breakaway province of Abkhazia with Abkhazian forces.[479][480]
Despite existing or past tensions between Russia and most of the post-Soviet states, Putin has followed the policy of Eurasian integration. Putin endorsed the idea of a Eurasian Union in 2011;[481][482] the concept was proposed by the president of Kazakhstan in 1994.[483] On 18 November 2011, the presidents of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia signed an agreement setting a target of establishing the Eurasian Union by 2015.[484] The Eurasian Union was established on 1 January 2015.[485]
Under Putin, Russia's relations have improved significantly with Uzbekistan, the second largest post-Soviet republic after Ukraine. This was demonstrated in Putin's visit to Tashkent in May 2000, after lukewarm relations under Yeltsin and Islam Karimov who had long distanced itself from Moscow.[486] In another meeting in 2014, Russia agreed to write off Uzbek debt.[487]
A theme of a greater Soviet region, including the former USSR and many of its neighbors or imperial-era states—rather than just post-Soviet Russia—has been consistent in Putin's May Day speeches.[488][489][490]
On 22 December 2022, Putin addressed the Security Council in a speech where he did not use the term "Special Military Operation" but instead called the fighting in Ukraine a "war". Anti-Putin activists have called for Putin to be prosecuted for breaking a law passed to stop people calling the Special Military Operation a war. This law carries a penalty of up to 15 years in jail.[491]
On 25 December, he openly declared in a TV interview that the goal of the invasion is "to unite the Russian people."[492]
On 14 December 2023, President Putin held a press conference where he indicated that Russian would only negotiate with Ukraine "when we achieve our objectives". He stated that another mobilization wasn't required as "617,000" Russian soldiers were fighting in Ukraine.[493]
United States, Western Europe, and NATO
Under Putin, Russia's relationships with NATO and the U.S. have passed through several stages. When he first became president, relations were cautious, but after the 9/11 attacks Putin quickly supported the U.S. in the War on Terror and the opportunity for partnership appeared.[495] According to Stephen F. Cohen, the U.S. "repaid by further expansion of NATO to Russia's borders and by unilateral withdrawal from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty",[495] but others pointed out the applications from new countries willing to join NATO was driven primarily by Russian's behavior in Chechnya, Transnistria, Abkhazia, Yanayev putsch as well as calls to restore USSR in its previous borders by prominent Russian politicians.[496][497]
From 2003, when Russia strongly opposed the U.S. when it waged the Iraq War, Putin became ever more distant from the West, and relations steadily deteriorated. According to Russia scholar Stephen F. Cohen, the narrative of the mainstream U.S. media, following that of the White House, became anti-Putin.[495] In an interview with Michael Stürmer, Putin said there were three questions which most concerned Russia and Eastern Europe: namely, the status of Kosovo, the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe and American plans to build missile defence sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, and suggested that all three were linked.[498] His view was that concessions by the West on one of the questions might be met with concessions from Russia on another.[498]
— Putin criticizing the United States in his Munich Speech, 2007[499]
In a January 2007 interview, Putin said Russia was in favor of a democratic multipolar world and strengthening the systems of international law.[500] In February 2007, Putin criticized what he called the United States' monopolistic dominance in global relations, and "almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations". He said the result of it is that "no one feels safe! Because no one can feel that international law is like a stone wall that will protect them. Of course such a policy stimulates an arms race".[501] This came to be known as the Munich Speech, and NATO secretary Jaap de Hoop Scheffer called the speech "disappointing and not helpful."[502]
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The months following Putin's Munich Speech[501] were marked by tension and a surge in rhetoric on both sides of the Atlantic. Both Russian and American officials, however, denied the idea of a new Cold War.[503] Putin publicly opposed plans for the U.S. missile shield in Europe and presented President George W. Bush with a counterproposal on 7 June 2007 which was declined.[504] Russia suspended its participation in the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty on 11 December 2007.[505]
Putin opposed Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence from Serbia on 17 February 2008, warning that it would destabilize the whole system of international relations.[506][better source needed] He described the recognition of Kosovo's independence by several major world powers as "a terrible precedent, which will de facto blow apart the whole system of international relations, developed not over decades, but over centuries", and that "they have not thought through the results of what they are doing. At the end of the day it is a two-ended stick and the second end will come back and hit them in the face".[507] In March 2014, Putin used Kosovo's declaration of independence as a justification for recognizing the independence of Crimea, citing the so-called "Kosovo independence precedent".[508][509]
After the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. in 2001, Putin had good relations with American President George W. Bush, and many western European leaders. His "cooler" and "more business-like" relationship with German chancellor, Angela Merkel is often attributed to Merkel's upbringing in the former DDR, where Putin was stationed as a KGB agent.[510] He had a very friendly and warm relationship with the former Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi;[511] the two leaders often described their relationship as a close friendship, continuing to organize bilateral meetings even after Berlusconi's resignation in November 2011.[512] When Berlusconi died in 2023, Putin described him as an "extraordinary man" and a "true friend".[513][514]
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The NATO-led military intervention in Libya in 2011 prompted a widespread wave of criticism from several world leaders, including Putin, who said that the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 is "defective and flawed", adding: "It allows everything. It resembles medieval calls for crusades."[515]
In late 2013, Russian-American relations deteriorated further when the United States canceled a summit for the first time since 1960 after Putin gave asylum to American Edward Snowden, who had leaked massive amounts of classified information from the NSA.[516][517] In 2014, Russia was suspended from the G8 group as a result of its annexation of Crimea.[518][519] Putin gave a speech highly critical of the United States, accusing them of destabilizing world order and trying to "reshape the world" to its own benefit.[520] In June 2015, Putin said that Russia has no intention of attacking NATO.[521]
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On 9 November 2016, Putin congratulated Donald Trump on becoming the 45th president of the United States.[523] In December 2016, US intelligence officials (headed by James Clapper) quoted by CBS News stated that Putin approved the email hacking and cyber attacks during the U.S. election, against the Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. A spokesman for Putin denied the reports.[524] Putin has repeatedly accused Hillary Clinton, who served as U.S. secretary of state from 2009 to 2013 of interfering in Russia's internal affairs,[525] and in December 2016, Clinton accused Putin of having a personal grudge against her.[526][527]
With the election of Trump, Putin's favorability in the U.S. increased. A Gallup poll in February 2017 revealed a positive view of Putin among 22% of Americans, the highest since 2003.[528] Putin has stated that U.S.–Russian relations, already at the lowest level since the end of the Cold War,[529] have continued to deteriorate after Trump took office in January 2017.[530]
On 18 June 2020, The National Interest published a nine-thousand-word essay by Putin, titled "The Real Lessons of the 75th Anniversary of World War II".[531] In the essay, Putin criticizes the Western historical view of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact as the start of World War II, stating that the Munich Agreement was the beginning.[532]
On 21 February 2023, Putin suspended Russia's participation in the New START nuclear arms reduction treaty with the United States.[533]
On 25 March, President Putin announced the stationing of tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus. Russia would maintain control of the weapons. President Putin told Russian TV: "There is nothing unusual here either. Firstly, the United States has been doing this for decades. They have long deployed their tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of their allied countries."[534]
United Kingdom
In 2003, relations between Russia and the United Kingdom deteriorated when the United Kingdom granted political asylum to Putin's former patron, oligarch Boris Berezovsky.[535] This deterioration was intensified by allegations that the British were spying and making secret payments to pro-democracy and human rights groups.[536] A survey conducted in the United Kingdom in 2022 found Putin to be among the least popular foreign leaders, with 8% of British respondents holding a positive opinion.[537]
Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko
The end of 2006 brought more strained relations in the wake of the death by polonium poisoning in London of former KGB and FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko, who became an MI6 agent in 2003. In 2007, the crisis in relations continued with the expulsion of four Russian envoys over Russia's refusal to extradite former KGB bodyguard Andrei Lugovoi to face charges in the murder.[535] Mirroring the British actions, Russia expelled UK diplomats and took other retaliatory steps.[535]
In 2015, the British Government launched a public inquiry into Litvinenko's death, presided over by Robert Owen, a former British High Court judge.[538] The Owen report, published on 21 January 2016, stated "The FSB operation to kill Mr. Litvinenko was probably approved by Mr Patrushev and also by President Putin."[539] The report outlined some possible motives for the murder, including Litvinenko's public statements and books about the alleged involvement of the FSB in mass murder, and what was "undoubtedly a personal dimension to the antagonism" between Putin and Litvinenko.[540]
Poisoning of Sergei Skripal
On 4 March 2018, former double agent Sergei Skripal was poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent in Salisbury.[541] Ten days later, the British government formally accused the Russian state of attempted murder, a charge which Russia denied.[542] After the UK expelled 23 Russian diplomats (an action which would later be responded to with a Russian expulsion of 23 British diplomats),[543] British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said on 16 March that it was "overwhelmingly likely" Putin had personally ordered the poisoning of Skripal. Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the allegation "shocking and unpardonable diplomatic misconduct".[544]
Latin America
Public image
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Polls and rankings
The director of the Levada Center stated in 2015 that drawing conclusions from Russian poll results or comparing them to polls in democratic states was irrelevant, as there is no real political competition in Russia, where, unlike in democratic states, Russian voters are not offered any credible alternatives and public opinion is primarily formed by state-controlled media, which promotes those in power and discredits alternative candidates.[585]
In a June 2007 public opinion survey, Putin's approval rating was 81%, the second-highest of any leader in the world that year.[586] In January 2013, at the time of the 2011–2013 Russian protests, Putin's rating fell to 62%, the lowest since 2000.[587] After EU and U.S. sanctions against Russian officials as a result of the crisis in Ukraine, Putin's approval rating reached 87% in August 2014.[588] In February 2015, based on domestic polling, Putin was ranked the world's most popular politician.[589] In June 2015, Putin's approval rating climbed to 89%, an all-time high.[590][591][592] Observers saw Putin's high approval ratings in 2010s as a consequence of improvements in living standards, and Russia's reassertion on the world scene during his presidency.[593][594] Putin was also highly popular in some non-Western countries, such as Vietnam, where his approval rating was 89% in 2017.[595]
Despite high approval for Putin, public confidence in the Russian economy was low, dropping to levels in 2016 that rivaled the lows in 2009 at the height of the global economic crisis.[596] Putin's performance in reining in corruption is unpopular among Russians. Newsweek reported in 2017 that a poll "indicated that 67% held Putin personally responsible for high-level corruption".[597] Corruption is a significant problem in Russia.[598][599]
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In October 2018, two-thirds of Russians surveyed agreed that "Putin bears full responsibility for the problems of the country" which has been attributed[601] to a decline in a popular belief in "good tsar and bad boyars", a traditional attitude towards justifying failures at the top of the ruling hierarchy in Russia.[602] In January 2019, the percentage of Russians trusting Putin hit a then-historic low – 33%.[603] In April 2019 Gallup poll showed a record number of Russians, 20%, willing to permanently emigrate from Russia.[604] The decline was even larger in the 17–25 age group, "who find themselves largely disconnected from the country's aging leadership, nostalgic Soviet rhetoric and nepotistic agenda". Putin's approval rating among young Russians was 32% in January 2019. The percentage willing to emigrate permanently in this group was 41%. 60% had favorable views of the US (three times more than in the 55+ age group).[605] Decline in support for the president and government is visible in other polls, such as a rapidly growing readiness to protest against poor living conditions.
In May 2020, amid the COVID crisis, Putin's approval rating was 68%, when respondents were presented a list of names (closed question),[606] and 27% when respondents were expected to name politicians they trust (open question).[607] This has been attributed to continued post-Crimea economic stagnation but also an apathetic response to the pandemic crisis in Russia.[608] Polls conducted in November 2021 after the failure of a Russian COVID-19 vaccination campaign indicated distrust of Putin was a major contributing factor for vaccine hesitancy, with regional polls indicating numbers as low as 20–30% in the Volga Federal District.[609]
In May 2021, 33% indicated Putin in response to "who would you vote for this weekend?" among Moscow respondents and 40% outside Moscow.[610] A survey released in October 2021 found 53% of respondents saying they trusted Putin.[611]
Observers see a generational struggle among Russians over perception of Putin's rule, with younger Russians more likely to be against Putin and older Russians more likely to accept the narrative presented by state-controlled media in Russia.[612] Putin's support among Russians aged 18–24 was only 20% in December 2020.[613]
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Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, state-controlled TV, where most Russians get their news, presented the invasion as a "special military operation" and liberation mission, in line with the government's narrative.[615][616][617] The Russian censorship apparatus Roskomnadzor ordered the country's media to employ information only from state sources or face fines and blocks.[618] The Russian media was banned from using the words "war", "invasion" or "aggression" to describe the invasion,[616] with media outlets being blocked as a result.[619]
In late February 2022, a survey conducted by the independent research group Russian Field found that 59% of respondents supported the "special military operation" in Ukraine.[620] According to the poll, in the group of 18-to-24-year-olds, only 29% supported the "special military operation".[621] In late February and mid-March 2022 two polls surveyed Russians' sentiments about the "special military operation" in Ukraine. The results were obtained by Radio Liberty.[622] 71% of Russians polled said that they supported the "special military operation" in Ukraine.[623][622]
When asked how they were affected by the actions of Putin, a third said they strongly believed Putin was working in their interests. Another 26% said he was working in their interests to some extent. In general, most Russians believe that it would be better if Putin remained president for as long as possible.[623][622] Similarly, a survey conducted in early March found 58% of Russian respondents approved of the operation.[624][625]
In March 2022, 97% of Ukrainians said they had an unfavorable view of Putin, and 98% of Ukrainians – including 82% of ethnic Russians living in Ukraine – said they did not believe any part of Ukraine was rightfully part of Russia.[626] A poll published on 30 March in Russia saw Putin's approval rating jump, from 71% in February, to 83%.[627][628] However, experts warned that the figures may not accurately reflect the public mood, as the public tends to rally around leaders during war and some may be hiding their true opinions,[629] especially with the Russian 2022 war censorship laws prohibiting dissemination of "fake information" about the military.[630] Many respondents do not want to answer pollsters' questions for fear of negative consequences.[620] When researchers commissioned a survey on Russians' attitudes to the war, 29,400 out of 31,000 refused to answer.[631] The Levada Center's director, stated that early feelings of "shock and confusion" was being replaced with the belief that Russia was being besieged and that Russians must rally around their leader.[619] The Kremlin's analysis concluded that public support for the war was broad but not deep, and that most Russians would accept anything Putin labeled a victory. In September 2023, the head of the VTsIOM state pollster Valery Fyodorov said in an interview that only 10-15% of Russians actively supported the war, and that "most Russians are not demanding the conquest of Kyiv or Odesa."[319]
Cult of personality
Putin has cultivated a cult of personality for himself with an outdoorsy, sporty, tough guy public image, demonstrating his physical prowess and taking part in unusual or dangerous acts, such as extreme sports and interaction with wild animals,[632] part of a public relations approach that, according to Wired, "deliberately cultivates the macho, take-charge superhero image".[633] In 2007, the tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda published a huge photograph of a shirtless Putin vacationing in the Siberian mountains under the headline "Be Like Putin".[634]
Numerous Kremlinologists have accused Putin of seeking to create a cult of personality around himself, an accusation that the Kremlin has denied.[635] Some of Putin's activities have been criticised for being staged;[636][637] outside of Russia, his macho image has been the subject of parody.[638][639][640] Putin's height has been estimated by Kremlin insiders to be between 155 and 165 centimetres (5 feet 1 inch and 5 feet 5 inches) tall but is usually given at 170 centimetres (5 feet 7 inches).[641][642]
There are many songs about Putin,[643] and Putin's name and image are widely used in advertisement and product branding.[633] Among the Putin-branded products are Putinka vodka, the PuTin brand of canned food, the Gorbusha Putina caviar, and a collection of T-shirts with his image.[644]
Public recognition in the West
In 2007, he was the Time Person of the Year.[645][646] In 2015, he was No. 1 on the Time's Most Influential People List.[647][648] Forbes ranked him the World's Most Powerful Individual every year from 2013 to 2016.[649] He was ranked the second most powerful individual by Forbes in 2018.[650]
In Germany, the word "Putinversteher" (female form "Putinversteherin") is a neologism and a political buzzword (Putin + verstehen), which literally translates "Putin understander", i.e., "one who understands Putin".[651] It is a pejorative reference to politicians and pundits who express empathy to Putin and may also be translated as "Putin-empathizer".[652]
Putinisms
Putin has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as putinisms.[653] Many of them were first made during his annual Q&A conferences, where Putin answered questions from journalists and other people in the studio, as well as from Russians throughout the country, who either phoned in or spoke from studios and outdoor sites across Russia. Putin is known for his often tough and sharp language, often alluding to Russian jokes and folk sayings.[653] Putin sometimes uses Russian criminal jargon (known as "fenya" in Russian), albeit not always correctly.[654]
Electoral history
Personal life
Family
On 28 July 1983, Putin married Lyudmila Shkrebneva, and they lived together in East Germany from 1985 to 1990. They have two daughters, Mariya Putina, born on 28 April 1985 in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg), and Yekaterina Putina, born on 31 August 1986 in Dresden, East Germany (now Germany).[708]
An investigation by Proekt published in November 2020 alleged that Putin has another daughter, Elizaveta, also known as Luiza Rozova,[709] (born in March 2003),[710] with Svetlana Krivonogikh.[4][711] In April 2008, the Moskovsky Korrespondent reported that Putin had divorced Lyudmila and was engaged to marry Olympic gold medalist Alina Kabaeva, a former rhythmic gymnast and Russian politician.[2] The story was denied,[2] and the newspaper was shut down shortly thereafter.[3] Putin and Lyudmila continued to make public appearances together as spouses,[712][713] while the status of his relationship with Kabaeva became a topic of speculation.[714]
On 6 June 2013, Putin and Lyudmila announced that their marriage was over; on 1 April 2014, the Kremlin confirmed that the divorce had been finalised.[715][716][717] Kabaeva reportedly gave birth to a daughter by Putin in 2015;[718][719] this report was denied.[718] Kabaeva reportedly gave birth to twin sons by Putin in 2019.[5][720] However, in 2022, Swiss media, citing the couple's Swiss gynecologist, wrote that on both occasions Kabaeva gave birth to a boy.[6]
Putin has two grandsons, born in 2012 and 2017,[721][722] through Maria.[723] He reportedly also has a granddaughter, born in 2017, through Katerina.[724][725] His cousin, Igor Putin, was a director at Moscow-based Master Bank and was accused in a number of money-laundering scandals.[726][727]
Wealth
Official figures released during the legislative election of 2007 put Putin's wealth at approximately 3.7 million rubles (US$280,000) in bank accounts, a private 77.4-square-meter (833 sq ft) apartment in Saint Petersburg, and miscellaneous other assets.[728][729] Putin's reported 2006 income totaled 2 million rubles (approximately $152,000). In 2012, Putin reported an income of 3.6 million rubles ($270,000).[730][731] Putin has been photographed wearing a number of expensive wristwatches, collectively valued at $700,000, nearly six times his annual salary.[732][733] Putin has been known on occasion to give watches valued at thousands of dollars as gifts, for example a watch identified as a Blancpain to a Siberian boy he met while on vacation in 2009, and another similar watch to a factory worker the same year.[734]
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According to Russian opposition politicians and journalists,[735][736] Putin secretly possesses a multi-billion-dollar fortune via successive ownership of stakes in a number of Russian companies.[737][738] According to one editorial in The Washington Post, "Putin might not technically own these 43 aircraft, but, as the sole political power in Russia, he can act like they're his".[739] An RIA Novosti journalist argued that "[Western] intelligence agencies ... could not find anything". These contradictory claims were analyzed by Polygraph.info,[740] which looked at a number of reports by Western (Anders Åslund estimate of $100–160 billion) and Russian (Stanislav Belkovsky estimated of $40 billion) analysts, CIA (estimate of $40 billion in 2007) as well as counterarguments of Russian media. Polygraph concluded:
In April 2016, 11 million documents belonging to Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca were leaked to the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and the Washington-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. The name of Putin does not appear in any of the records, and Putin denied his involvement with the company.[741] However, various media have reported on three of Putin's associates on the list.[742] According to the Panama Papers leak, close trusted associates of Putin own offshore companies worth US$2 billion in total.[743] The German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung regards the possibility of Putin's family profiting from this money as plausible.[744][745]
According to the paper, the US$2 billion had been "secretly shuffled through banks and shadow companies linked to Putin's associates", such as construction billionaires Arkady and Boris Rotenberg, and Bank Rossiya, previously identified by the U.S. State Department as being treated by Putin as his personal bank account, had been central in facilitating this. It concludes that "Putin has shown he is willing to take aggressive steps to maintain secrecy and protect [such] communal assets."[746][747]
A significant proportion of the money trail leads to Putin's best friend Sergei Roldugin. Although a musician, and in his own words, not a businessman, it appears he has accumulated assets valued at $100m, and possibly more. It has been suggested he was picked for the role because of his low profile.[742] There have been speculations that Putin, in fact, owns the funds,[748] and Roldugin just acted as a proxy.[749] Garry Kasparov said that "[Putin] controls enough money, probably more than any other individual in the history of human race".[750]
Residences
Official government residences
As president and prime minister, Putin has lived in numerous official residences throughout the country.[751] These residences include: the Moscow Kremlin, Novo-Ogaryovo in Moscow Oblast, Gorki-9 [ru] near Moscow, Bocharov Ruchey in Sochi, Dolgiye Borody (residence) in Novgorod Oblast, and Riviera in Sochi.[752] In August 2012, critics of Putin listed the ownership of 20 villas and palaces, nine of which were built during Putin's 12 years in power.[753]
Personal residences
Soon after Putin returned from his KGB service in Dresden, East Germany, he built a dacha in Solovyovka on the eastern shore of Lake Komsomolskoye on the Karelian Isthmus in Priozersky District of Leningrad Oblast, near St. Petersburg. After the dacha burned down in 1996, Putin built a new one identical to the original and was joined by a group of seven friends who built dachas nearby. In 1996, the group formally registered their fraternity as a co-operative society, calling it Ozero ("Lake") and turning it into a gated community.[754]
A massive Italianate-style mansion costing an alleged US$1 billion[755] and dubbed "Putin's Palace" is under construction near the Black Sea village of Praskoveevka. In 2012, Sergei Kolesnikov, a former business associate of Putin's, told the BBC's Newsnight programme that he had been ordered by Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin to oversee the building of the palace.[756] He also said that the mansion, built on government land and sporting three helipads, plus a private road paid for from state funds and guarded by officials wearing uniforms of the official Kremlin guard service, have been built for Putin's private use.[757]
On 19 January 2021, two days after Alexei Navalny was detained by Russian authorities upon his return to Russia, a video investigation by him and the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) was published accusing Putin of using fraudulently obtained funds to build the estate for himself in what he called "the world's biggest bribe." In the investigation, Navalny said that the estate is 39 times the size of Monaco and cost over 100 billion rubles ($1.35 billion) to construct. It also showed aerial footage of the estate via a drone and a detailed floorplan of the palace that Navalny said was given by a contractor, which he compared to photographs from inside the palace that were leaked onto the Internet in 2011. He also detailed an elaborate corruption scheme allegedly involving Putin's inner circle that allowed Putin to hide billions of dollars to build the estate.[758][759][760]
Since the prelude to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Putin prefers to travel in an armored train to flying.[761]
Pets
_05.jpg)
Putin has received five dogs from various nation leaders: Konni, Buffy, Yume, Verni and Pasha. Konni died in 2014. When Putin first became president, the family had two poodles, Tosya and Rodeo. They reportedly stayed with his ex-wife Lyudmila after their divorce.[762]
Religion
Putin is Russian Orthodox. His mother was a devoted Christian believer who attended the Russian Orthodox Church, while his father was an atheist.[763] Though his mother kept no icons at home, she attended church regularly, despite government persecution of her religion at that time. His mother secretly baptized him as a baby, and she regularly took him to services.[31]
According to Putin, his religious awakening began after a serious car crash involving his wife in 1993, and a life-threatening fire that burned down their dacha in August 1996.[763] Shortly before an official visit to Israel, Putin's mother gave him his baptismal cross, telling him to get it blessed. Putin states, "I did as she said and then put the cross around my neck. I have never taken it off since."[31]
When asked in 2007 whether he believes in God, he responded: "There are things I believe, which should not in my position, at least, be shared with the public at large for everybody's consumption because that would look like self-advertising or a political striptease."[764] Putin's rumoured confessor is Russian Orthodox Bishop Tikhon Shevkunov.[765] The sincerity of his Christianity has been rejected by his former advisor Sergei Pugachev.[766]
Sports
Putin watches football and supports FC Zenit Saint Petersburg.[767] He also displays an interest in ice hockey and bandy,[768] and played in a star-studded hockey game on his 63rd birthday.[769]
Putin has been practicing judo since he was 11 years old,[770] before switching to sambo at the age of fourteen.[771] He won competitions in both sports in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg). He was awarded eighth dan of the black belt in 2012, becoming the first Russian to achieve the status.[772] He was rewarded an eighth-degree karate black belt in 2014.[773]
He co-authored a book entitled Learn Judo with Vladimir Putin in Russian (2000),[h] and Judo: History, Theory, Practice in English (2004).[774] Benjamin Wittes, a black belt in taekwondo and aikido and editor of Lawfare, has disputed Putin's martial arts skills, stating that there is no video evidence of Putin displaying any real noteworthy judo skills.[775][776]
In March 2022, Putin was removed from all positions in the International Judo Federation (IJF) due to the Russian war in Ukraine.[777]
Health
In July 2022, the director of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, William Burns, stated they had no evidence to suggest Putin was unstable or in bad health. The statement was made because of increasing unconfirmed media speculation about Putin's health. Burns had previously been U.S. Ambassador to Russia, and had personally observed Putin for over two decades, including a personal meeting in November 2021. A Kremlin spokesperson also dismissed rumours of Putin's bad health.[778]
The Russian political magazine Sobesednik (Russian: Собеседник) alleged in 2018 that Putin had a sensory room installed in his private residence in the Novgorod Oblast.[779]
The White House, as well as Western generals, politicians, and political analysts, have questioned Putin's mental health after two years of isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic.[780][781][782]
In April 2022, tabloid newspaper The Sun reported that based on video footage Putin may have Parkinson's disease.[783][784][785] This speculation, which has not been supported by medical professionals, has spread in part due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which many saw as an irrational act.[785] The Kremlin[783] rejected the possibility of Parkinson's along with outside medical professionals, who stress that it is impossible to diagnose the condition based on video clips alone.[785]
Awards and honours
See also
Alexei Navalny
Alexei Navalny | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
Алексей Навальный | ||||
_1.jpg) Navalny in 2011 | ||||
| Leader of Russia of the Future[a] | ||||
| In office 28 March 2019 – 17 January 2021[b] | ||||
| Deputy | Leonid Volkov | |||
| Preceded by | Ivan Zhdanov | |||
| Succeeded by | Leonid Volkov (acting) | |||
| In office 17 November 2013 – 19 May 2018 | ||||
| Preceded by | Office established | |||
| Succeeded by | Ivan Zhdanov | |||
| Chairman of the Session of the Russian Opposition Coordination Council | ||||
| In office 27 October 2012 – 24 November 2012 | ||||
| Preceded by | Office established | |||
| Succeeded by | Garry Kasparov | |||
| Member of the Russian Opposition Coordination Council | ||||
| In office 22 October 2012 – 19 October 2013 | ||||
| Freelance Advisor to the Governor of Kirov Oblast | ||||
| In office 4 May 2009 – 11 September 2009 | ||||
| Governor | Nikita Belykh | |||
| Chief of Staff of the Yabloko Moscow Regional Branch | ||||
| In office 12 April 2004 – 22 February 2007 | ||||
| Personal details | ||||
| Born | 4 June 1976 Butyn, Russian SFSR, Soviet Union[1] | |||
| Died | 16 February 2024 (aged 47) Kharp, Yamalia, Russia | |||
| Political party |
| |||
| Other political affiliations |
| |||
| Spouse | ||||
| Children | 2[2] | |||
| Residence | Moscow | |||
| Education | ||||
| Occupation |
| |||
| Known for | Anti-corruption activism | |||
| Signature |  | |||
| Website | navalny | |||
| YouTube information | ||||
| Channel | ||||
| Subscribers | 6.21 million[3] (16 February 2024) | |||
| Total views | 1.49 billion[3] (16 February 2024) | |||
| ||
|---|---|---|
Political activities
Terminology Associates Related | ||
.jpg)
Alexei Anatolyevich Navalny[c][d] (Russian: Алексей Анатольевич Навальный, IPA: [ɐlʲɪkˈsʲej ɐnɐˈtolʲjɪvʲɪtɕ nɐˈvalʲnɨj]; 4 June 1976 – 16 February 2024) was a Russian opposition leader,[2][4] lawyer, anti-corruption activist, and political prisoner. He organised anti-government demonstrations and ran for office to advocate reforms against corruption in Russia and against President Vladimir Putin and his government.[5] Navalny was founder of the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK). He was recognised by Amnesty International as a prisoner of conscience, and was awarded the Sakharov Prize for his work on human rights.
Through his social media channels, Navalny and his team published material about corruption in Russia, organised political demonstrations and promoted his campaigns. In a 2011 radio interview, he described Russia's ruling party, United Russia, as a "party of crooks and thieves", which became a popular epithet. Navalny and the FBK have published investigations detailing alleged corruption by high-ranking Russian officials and their associates.
Navalny twice received a suspended sentence for embezzlement, in 2013 and 2014. Both criminal cases were widely considered politically motivated and intended to bar him from running in future elections. He ran in the 2013 Moscow mayoral election and came in second with 27% of the vote but was barred from running in the 2018 presidential election.
In August 2020, Navalny was hospitalised in serious condition after being poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent. He was medically evacuated to Berlin and discharged a month later. Navalny accused Putin of being responsible for his poisoning, and an investigation implicated agents from the Federal Security Service. In January 2021, Navalny returned to Russia and was immediately detained on accusations of violating parole conditions while he was hospitalised in Germany. Following his arrest, mass protests were held across Russia.[6] In February 2021, his suspended sentence was replaced with a prison sentence of over 21⁄2 years' detention, and his organisations were later designated as extremist and liquidated. In March 2022, Navalny was sentenced to an additional nine years in prison after being found guilty of embezzlement and contempt of court in a new trial described as a sham by Amnesty International;[7][8] his appeal was rejected and in June, he was transferred to a high-security prison.[9] In August 2023, Navalny was sentenced to an additional 19 years in prison on extremism charges.[10]
In December 2023, Navalny went missing from prison for almost three weeks. He re-emerged in an Arctic Circle corrective colony in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug.[11][12] On 16 February 2024, the Russian prison service reported that Navalny had died at the age of 47.[13][14] His death sparked protests, both in Russia and in various other countries. Accusations against the Russian authorities in connection with his death have been made by Western governments and international organisations.
Early life and education
Navalny was of Russian and Ukrainian descent.[15][16] His father was from Zalissia, a former village near the Belarusian border that was relocated due to the Chernobyl disaster in Ivankiv Raion, Kyiv Oblast, Ukraine. Navalny grew up in Obninsk, about 100 kilometres (62 mi) southwest of Moscow, but spent his childhood summers with his grandmother in Ukraine, acquiring proficiency in the Ukrainian language.[15][17] His parents, Anatoly Navalny, and Lyudmila Navalnaya, own a basket-weaving factory, which they have run since 1994, in the village of Kobyakovo, Vologda Oblast. As of 2012, they were still running the factory.[18]
Navalny graduated from Kalininets secondary school (level 3 according to the ISCED) in 1993.[19] He graduated from the Peoples' Friendship University of Russia in 1998 with a law degree.[2] He then studied securities and exchanges at the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, graduating in 2001.[20][21] He received a scholarship to the Yale World Fellows program at Yale University in 2010.[22][23]
Legal career
From 1998, Navalny worked as a lawyer for various Russian companies.[19]
In 2009, Navalny became an advocate and a member of advocate's chamber (bar association) of Kirov Oblast (registration number 43/547). In 2010, due to his move to Moscow, he ceased to be a member of advocate's chamber of Kirov Oblast and became a member of advocate's chamber of Moscow (registration number 77/9991).[24][25]
In November 2013, after the judgement in the Kirovles case had entered into force, Navalny was deprived of advocate status.[26][27]
Political activity
Yabloko
In 2000, following the announcement of a new law that raised the electoral threshold for State Duma elections, Navalny joined the Russian United Democratic Party Yabloko. According to Navalny, the law was stacked against Yabloko and Union of Right Forces, and he decided to join, even though he was not "a big fan" of either organisation.[28] In 2001, he was listed as a member of the party.[28] In 2002, he was elected to the regional council of the Moscow branch of Yabloko.[29] In 2003, he headed the Moscow subdivision of the election campaign of the party for the parliamentary election held in December. In April 2004, Navalny became Chief of Staff of the Moscow branch of Yabloko, where he remained until February 2007. Also in 2004, he became Deputy Chief of the Moscow branch of the party. From 2006 to 2007, he was a member of the Federal Council of the party.[30]
In August 2005, Navalny was admitted to the Social Council of the Central Administrative Okrug of Moscow, created before the Moscow City Duma election held later that year, in which he took part as a candidate. In November, he was one of the initiators of the Youth Public Chamber, intended to help younger politicians take part in legislative initiatives.[30] At the same time, in 2005, Navalny started another youth social movement, named "DA! – Democratic Alternative".[e] The project was not connected to Yabloko or any other political party. Within the movement, Navalny participated in several projects. In particular, he was one of the organisers of the movement-run political debates, which soon resonated in the media.[30] Navalny also organised television debates via state-run Moscow channel TV Center; two initial episodes showed high ratings, but the show was suddenly canceled. According to Navalny, the authorities prohibited the appearance of certain people on television.[30]
In late 2006, Navalny appealed to the Moscow City Hall, asking it to grant permission to conduct the nationalist 2006 Russian march. However, he added that Yabloko condemned "any ethnic or racial hatred and any xenophobia" and called on the police to oppose "any fascist, Nazi, xenophobic manifestations".[f]
In 2007, Navalny was expelled from Yabloko for asking to democratically re-elect the leadership of the party including Grigory Yavlinsky.[30]
2011 parliamentary election and protests
In December 2011, after parliamentary elections and accusations of electoral fraud,[32] approximately 6,000 people gathered in Moscow to protest the contested result, and an estimated 300 people were arrested, including Navalny. Navalny was arrested on 5 December.[33][34] After a period of uncertainty for his supporters, Navalny appeared in court and was sentenced to a maximum of 15 days "for defying a government official". Alexei Venediktov, editor-in-chief of Echo of Moscow radio station, called the arrest "a political mistake: jailing Navalny transforms him from an online leader into an offline one".[34] After his arrest, his blog became available in English.[33] Navalny was kept in the same prison as several other activists, including Ilya Yashin and Sergei Udaltsov, the unofficial leader of the Vanguard of Red Youth, a radical Russian communist youth group. Udaltsov went on a hunger strike to protest against the conditions.[35]
Upon his release on 20 December 2011, Navalny called on Russians to unite against Putin, who Navalny said would try to claim victory in the presidential election, which was held on 4 March 2012.[36]
After his release, Navalny informed reporters that it would be senseless for him to run in the presidential elections because the Kremlin would not allow the elections to be fair, but if free elections were held, he would "be ready" to run.[36] On 24 December, he helped lead a demonstration, estimated at 50,000 people, which was much larger than the previous post-election demonstration. Speaking to the crowd, he said, "I see enough people to take the Kremlin right now".[37]
In March 2012, after Putin was elected president, Navalny helped lead an anti-Putin rally in Moscow's Pushkinskaya Square, attended by between 14,000 and 20,000 people. After the rally, Navalny was detained by authorities for several hours, and then released.[38] On 8 May 2012, the day after Putin was inaugurated, Navalny and Udaltsov were arrested after an anti-Putin rally at Clean Ponds, and were each given 15-day jail sentences.[39] Amnesty International designated the two men prisoners of conscience.[40] On 11 June, Moscow prosecutors conducted a 12-hour search of Navalny's home, office, and the apartment of one of his relatives.[41] Soon afterwards, some of Navalny's personal emails were posted online by a pro-government blogger.[42]
New party
On 26 June 2012, it was announced that Navalny's comrades would establish a new political party based on e-democracy; Navalny declared he did not plan to participate in this project at the moment.[43] On 31 July, they filed a document to register an organising committee of a future party named "The People's Alliance".[44] The party identified itself as centrist; one of the then-current leaders of the party, and Navalny's ally Vladimir Ashurkov, explained this was intended to help the party get a large share of voters. Navalny said the concept of political parties was "outdated", and added his participation would make maintaining the party more difficult. However, he "blessed" the party and discussed its maintenance with its leaders. They, in turn, stated they wanted to eventually see Navalny as a member of the party.[45] On 15 December 2012 Navalny expressed his support of the party, saying, "The People's Alliance is my party", but again refused to join it, citing the criminal cases against him.[46]
On 10 April 2013, the party filed documents for the official registration of the party.[47] On 30 April, the registration of the party was suspended.[48] On 5 July 2013 the party was declined registration; according to Izvestia, not all founders of the party were present during the congress, even though the papers contained their signatures.[49] Navalny reacted to that with a tweet saying, "A salvo of all guns."[50] Following the mayoral election, on 15 September 2013, Navalny declared he would join and, possibly, head the party.[51] On 17 November 2013 Navalny was elected as the leader of the party.[52]
On 8 January 2014, Navalny's party filed documents for registration for the second time.[53] On 20 January, registration of the party was suspended;[54] according to Russian laws, no two parties can share a name.[55] On 8 February 2014, Navalny's party changed its name to "Progress Party".[56] On 25 February 2014, the party was registered, and[57] at this point, had six months to register regional branches in at least half of the federal subjects of Russia.[g] On 26 September 2014, the party declared it had registered 43 regional branches.[59] An unnamed source of Izvestia in the ministry said registrations completed after the six-month term would not be taken into consideration, adding, "Yes, trials are taking place in some regions ... they cannot register new branches in other regions during the trials, because the main term is over". Navalny's blog countered, "Our answer is simple. A six-month term for registration has been legally prolonged ad interim prosecution of appeals of denials and registration suspensions".[59]
On 1 February 2015, the party held a convention, where Navalny stated the party was preparing for the 2016 elections, declaring the party would maintain its activity across Russia, saying, "We are unabashed to work in remote lands where the opposition does not work. We can even [work] in Crimea". The candidates the party would appoint were to be chosen via primary elections; however, he added, the party's candidates may be removed from elections.[60] On 17 April 2015, the party initiated a coalition of democratic parties.[61] On 28 April 2015, the party was deprived of registration by the Ministry of Justice, which stated the party had not registered the required number of regional branches within six months after the official registration.[62] Krainev claimed that the party could be eliminated only by the Supreme Court, and he added that not all trials of registration of regional branches were over, calling the verdict "illegal twice". He added that the party would appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, and expressed confidence that the party would be restored and admitted to elections.[63] The next day, the party officially challenged the verdict.[64]
2013 Moscow mayoral candidacy
| Time | Sobyanin | Navalny | Ref |
|---|---|---|---|
| 29 August–2 September | 60.1% | 21.9% | [65] |
| 22–28 August | 63.9% | 19.8% | [66] |
| 15–21 August | 62.5% | 20.3% | [67] |
| 8–14 August | 63.5% | 19.9% | [68] |
| 1–7 August | 74.6% | 15.0% | [68] |
| 25–31 July | 76.2% | 16.7% | [69] |
| 18–24 July | 76.6% | 15.7% | [70] |
| 11–16 July | 76.2% | 14.4% | [71] |
| 4–10 July | 78.5% | 10.7% | [71] |
| 27 June–3 July | 77.9% | 10.8% | [71] |
On 30 May 2013, Sergey Sobyanin, the mayor of Moscow, argued an elected mayor is an advantage for the city compared to an appointed one,[72] and on 4 June, he announced he would meet President Vladimir Putin and ask him for a snap election, mentioning the Muscovites would agree the governor elections should take place in the city of Moscow and the surrounding Moscow Oblast simultaneously.[73] On 6 June, the request was granted,[74] and the next day, the Moscow City Duma appointed the election on 8 September, the national voting day.[75]
On 3 June, Navalny announced he would run for the post.[76] To become an official candidate, he would need either seventy thousand signatures of Muscovites or to be pegged for the office by a registered party, and then to collect 110 signatures of municipal deputies from 110 different subdivisions (three-quarters of Moscow's 146). Navalny chose to be pegged by a party, RPR–PARNAS.[77]
Among the six candidates who were officially registered as such, only two (Sobyanin and Communist Ivan Melnikov) were able to collect the required number of the signatures themselves, and the other four were given a number of signatures by the Council of Municipal Formations, following a recommendation by Sobyanin,[78] to overcome the requirement (Navalny accepted 49 signatures, and other candidates accepted 70, 70, and 82).[79]
On 17 July, Navalny was registered as one of the six candidates for the Moscow mayoral election.[80] On 18 July, he was sentenced to a five-year prison term for the embezzlement and fraud charges that were declared in 2012. Several hours after his sentencing, he pulled out of the race and called for a boycott of the election.[81] Later that day, the prosecution office requested that Navalny be freed on bail and released from travel restrictions, since the verdict had not yet taken legal effect, saying that he had previously followed the restrictions. Navalny was a mayoral candidate, and imprisonment would thus not comply with the rule for equal access to the electorate.[82] On his return to Moscow after being freed, pending an appeal, he vowed to stay in the race.[83] The Washington Post has speculated that his release was ordered by the Kremlin in order to make the election and Sobyanin appear more legitimate.[84]
Navalny's campaign was successful in fundraising: out of 103.4 million rubles (approximately $3.09 million as of the election day[rates 1]), the total size of his electoral fund, 97.3 million ($2.91 million) were transferred by individuals throughout Russia;[86] such an amount is unprecedented in Russia.[87] It achieved a high profile through an unprecedentedly large campaign organisation that involved around 20,000 volunteers who passed out leaflets and hung banners, in addition to conducting several campaign rallies a day around the city;[88] they were the main driving force for the campaign.[89] The New Yorker described the resulted campaign as "a miracle", along with Navalny's release on 19 July, the fundraising campaign, and the personality of Navalny himself.[90] The campaign received very little television coverage and did not utilise billboards. Thanks to Navalny's strong campaign (and Sobyanin's weak one[88]), his result grew over time, weakening Sobyanin's, and in the end of the campaign, he declared the runoff election (to be conducted if none of the candidates receives at least 50% of votes) was "a hair's breadth away".[91]
The largest sociological research organisations predicted that Sobyanin would win the election, scoring 58% to 64% of the vote; they expected Navalny to receive 15–20% of the vote, and the turnout was to be 45–52%. (Levada Center was the only one not to have made any predictions; the data it had on 28 August was similar to that of other organisations.)[92] The final results of the voting showed Navalny received 27% of the vote, more than candidates appointed by the parties that received second, third, fourth, and fifth highest results during the 2011 parliamentary elections, altogether. Navalny fared better in the center and southwest of Moscow, which have higher income and education levels.[84] Sobyanin received 51% of the vote, winning the election. The turnout was 32%.[93] The organisations explained the differences were because Sobyanin's electorate did not vote, as they felt that their candidate was guaranteed to win. Navalny's campaign office predicted Sobyanin would score 49–51%, and Navalny would get 24–26% of votes.[92]
Many experts said the election had been fair, that the number of irregularities had been much lower than those of other elections held within the country, and that the irregularities had had little effect on the result.[94][95] Dmitri Abyzalov, leading expert of Center of Political Conjuncture, added low turnout figures provide a further sign of fairness of the election, because that shows they were not overestimated.[94] However, according to Andrei Buzin, co-chairman of the GOLOS Association, State Departments of Social Security added people who did not originally want to vote to lists of those who would vote at home, with the number of such voters being 5% of those who voted, and added this did cause questions if Sobyanin would score 50% if this did not take place.[95] Dmitry Oreshkin, leader of the "People's election commission" project (who did a separate counting based on the data from election observers; their result for Sobyanin was 50%), said now that the runoff election was only 2% away, all details would be looked at very closely, and added it was impossible to prove "anything" juridically.[96]
On 9 September, the day following the election, Navalny publicly denounced the tally, saying, "We do not recognise the results. They are fake". Sobyanin's office rejected an offer of a vote recount.[97] On 12 September, Navalny addressed the Moscow City Court to overturn the result of the poll; the court rejected the assertion. Navalny then challenged the decision in the Supreme Court of Russia, but the court ruled that the election results were legitimate.[98]
RPR-PARNAS and democratic coalition
Following the mayoral election, Navalny was offered a position as the fourth co-chairman of RPR-PARNAS.[99] On 14 November 2014, the two remaining RPR-PARNAS co-chairmen, Boris Nemtsov and former Prime Minister of Russia Mikhail Kasyanov, declared it was the right moment to create a wide coalition of political forces, who favour the "European choice"; Navalny's Progress Party was seen as one of the potential participants.[100] However, on 27 February 2015, Nemtsov was shot dead. Prior to his assassination, Nemtsov worked on a project of a coalition, in which Navalny and Khodorkovsky would become co-chairmen of RPR-PARNAS. Navalny declared merging parties would invoke bureaucratic difficulties and question the legitimacy of party's right to participate in federal elections without signatures collecting.[101] However, Nemtsov's murder accelerated the work, and on 17 April, Navalny declared a wide discussion had taken place among Progress Party, RPR-PARNAS, and other closely aligned parties, which resulted in an agreement of formation of a new electoral bloc between the two leaders.[61] Soon thereafter, it was signed by four other parties and supported by Khodorkovsky's Open Russia foundation.[102] Electoral blocs are not present within the current[when?] law system of Russia, so it would be realised via means of a single party, RPR-PARNAS, which is not only eligible for participation in statewide elections, but is also currently[when?] not required to collect citizens' signatures for the right to participate in the State Duma elections scheduled for September 2016, due to the regional parliament mandate previously taken by Nemtsov. The candidates RPR-PARNAS would appoint were to be chosen via primary elections.[103]
On 5 July 2015, Kasyanov was elected as the only leader of RPR-PARNAS, and the party was renamed to just PARNAS. He added he would like to eventually re-establish the institution of co-chairmanship, adding, "Neither Alexei Navalny nor Mikhail Khodorkovsky will enter our party today and be elected as co-chairmen. But in the future, I think, such time will come".[104] On 7 July, in an interview released by TV Rain, he specified Navalny could not leave a party of his, and this would need to be completed by PARNAS adsorbing members of the Progress Party and other parties of the coalition, and Navalny would be to come at some point when he "grows into this and feels this could be done" and join the party as well.[105]
The coalition claimed to have collected enough citizens' signatures for registration in the four regions it originally aimed for. However, in one region, the coalition would declare some signatures and personal data have been altered by malevolent collectors;[106] signatures in the other regions have been rejected by regional election commissions.[107][108][109] In Novosibirsk Oblast, some election office staff went on a hunger strike, which was abandoned almost two weeks since its inception, when Khodorkovsky, Navalny, and Kasyanov publicly advised to do so.[110] Сomplaints have been issued to the Central Election Commission of Russia, after which the coalition has been registered as a participant in a regional election in one of the three contested regions, Kostroma Oblast. According to a source of Gazeta.ru "close to the Kremlin", the presidential administration saw coalition's chances as very low, yet was wary, but the restoration in one region occurred so PARNAS could "score a consolation goal".[111] According to the official election results, the coalition scored 2% of votes, not enough to overcome the 5% threshold; the party admitted the election was lost.[112]
2018 presidential election
Navalny announced his entry into the presidential race on 13 December 2016,[113][114] however on 8 February 2017, the Leninsky district court of Kirov repeated its sentence of 2013 (after the case has been sent to a new trial with a different judge by the Supreme Court which annulled the initial sentence after the decision of ECHR, which ruled that Russia had violated Navalny's right to a fair trial, in the Kirovles case) and charged him with a five-year suspended sentence.[115] This sentence, if it came into force and remained valid, might prohibit the future official registration of Navalny as a candidate. Navalny announced that he would pursue the annulment of the sentence that clearly contradicts the decision of ECHR. Moreover, Navalny announced that his presidential campaign would proceed independently of court decisions. He referred to the Russian Constitution (Article 32), which deprives only two groups of citizens of the right to be elected: those recognised by the court as legally unfit and those kept in places of confinement by a court sentence. According to Freedom House and The Economist, Navalny was the most viable contender to Vladimir Putin in the 2018 election.[116][117] Navalny organised a series of anti-corruption rallies in different cities across Russia in March. This appeal was responded to by the representatives of 95 Russian cities, and four cities abroad: London, Prague, Basel and Bonn.[118]
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Navalny was attacked by unknown assailants outside his office in the Anti-Corruption Foundation on 27 April 2017. They sprayed brilliant green dye, possibly mixed with other components, into his face in a Zelyonka attack that can damage eyes of the victim. He had been attacked before, earlier in the spring. In the second attack, the green-colored disinfectant had evidently been mixed with a caustic chemical, resulting in a chemical burn to his right eye.[119] He reportedly lost 80 percent of the sight in his right eye.[120][121] Navalny accused the Kremlin of orchestrating the attack.[122][123]
Navalny was released from jail on 27 July 2017 after spending 25 days of imprisonment. Before that, he was arrested in Moscow for participating in protests and was sentenced to 30 days in jail for organising illegal protests.[124]
In September 2017, Human Rights Watch accused Russian police of systematic interference with Navalny's presidential campaign. "The pattern of harassment and intimidation against Navalny's campaign is undeniable," said Hugh Williamson, Europe, and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "Russian authorities should let Navalny's campaigners work without undue interference and properly investigate attacks against them by ultra-nationalists and pro-government groups."[125] On 21 September, the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe invited Russian authorities, in connection with the Kirovles case, "to use urgently further avenues to erase the prohibition on Mr. Navalny's standing for election".[126]
Navalny was sentenced to 20 days in jail on 2 October 2017 for calls to participate in protests without approval from state authorities.[127]
In December 2017, Russia's Central Electoral Commission barred Navalny from running for president in 2018, citing Navalny's corruption conviction. The European Union said Navalny's removal cast "serious doubt" on the election. Navalny called for a boycott of the 2018 presidential election, stating his removal meant that millions of Russians were being denied their vote.[128] Navalny filed an appeal against the Russian Supreme Court's ruling on 3 January,[129] however a few days later on 6 January, the Supreme Court of Russia rejected his appeal.[130]
Navalny led protests on 28 January 2018 to urge a boycott of Russia's 2018 presidential election. Navalny was arrested on the day of the protest and then released the same day, pending trial. OVD-Info reported that 257 people were arrested throughout the country. According to Russian news reports, police stated Navalny was likely to be charged with calling for unauthorised demonstrations.[131] Two of Navalny's associates were given brief jail terms for urging people to attend unsanctioned opposition rallies. Navalny stated on 5 February 2018 the government was accusing Navalny of assaulting an officer during the protests.[132] Navalny was among 1600 people detained during 5 May protests prior to Putin's inauguration; Navalny was charged with disobeying police.[133] On 15 May, he was sentenced to 30 days in jail.[134] Immediately after his release on 25 September 2018, he was arrested and convicted for organising illegal demonstrations and sentenced to another 20 days in jail.[135]
2019 Moscow City Duma elections
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During the 2019 Moscow City Duma election Navalny supported independent candidates, most of whom were not allowed to participate in the elections, which led to mass street protests. In July 2019, Navalny was arrested, first for ten days, and then, almost immediately, for 30 days. On the evening of 28 July, he was hospitalised with severe damage to his eyes and skin. At the hospital, he was diagnosed with an "allergy," although this diagnosis was disputed by Anastasia Vasilieva, an ophthalmologist who previously treated Navalny after a chemical attack by an alleged protester in 2017.[136] Vasilieva questioned the diagnosis and suggested the possibility that Navalny's condition was the result of "the damaging effects of undetermined chemicals".[137] On 29 July 2019, Navalny was discharged from hospital and taken back to prison, despite the objections of his personal physician who questioned the hospital's motives.[136][138] Supporters of Navalny and journalists near the hospital were attacked by the police and many were detained.[137] In response, he initiated the Smart Voting project.[139]
2020 constitutional referendum
Navalny campaigned against the vote on constitutional amendments that took place on 1 July, calling it a "coup" and a "violation of the constitution".[140] He also said that the changes would allow President Putin to become "president for life".[141][142] After the results were announced, he called them a "big lie" that did not reflect public opinion.[143] The reforms include an amendment allowing Putin to serve another two terms in office (until 2036), after his fourth presidential term ends.[140]
Anti-corruption investigations
In 2008, Navalny invested 300,000 rubles in stocks of five oil and gas companies: Rosneft, Gazprom, Gazprom Neft, Lukoil, and Surgutneftegas, thus becoming an activist shareholder.[28] As such, he began to aim at making the financial assets of these companies transparent. This is required by law, but there are allegations that high-level managers of these companies are involved in theft and resisting transparency.[144]
In November 2010, Navalny published[145] confidential documents about Transneft's auditing. According to Navalny's blog, about US$4 billion were stolen by Transneft's leaders during the construction of the Eastern Siberia–Pacific Ocean oil pipeline.[146][147] In December, Navalny announced the launch of the RosPil project, which seeks to bring to light corrupt practices in the government procurement process.[148] The project takes advantage of existing procurement regulation that requires all government requests for tender to be posted online. Information about winning bids must be posted online as well. The name RosPil is a pun on the slang term "распил" (literally "sawing"),[149] implying the embezzlement of state funds.[150]
In May 2011, Navalny launched RosYama (literally "Russian Hole"), a project that allowed individuals to report potholes and track government responses to complaints.[151] In August, Navalny published papers related to a scandalous real estate deal[152] between the Hungarian and Russian governments.[153][154] According to the papers, Hungary sold a former embassy building in Moscow for US$21 million to an offshore company of Viktor Vekselberg, who immediately resold it to the Russian government for US$116 million. The property's real value was estimated at US$52 million. Irregularities in the paper trail implied collusion. Three Hungarian officials responsible for the deal were detained in February 2011.[155]
Navalny was founder of the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK).[156]
In February 2012, Navalny concluded that Russian federal money going to Ramzan Kadyrov's Chechen Interior Ministry was being spent "in a totally shadowy and fraudulent way."[157] In May, Navalny accused Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov of corruption, stating that companies owned by Roman Abramovich and Alisher Usmanov had transferred tens of millions of dollars to Shuvalov's company, allowing Shuvalov to share in the profit from Usmanov's purchase of the British steel company Corus. Navalny posted scans of documents to his blog showing the money transfers.[158] Usmanov and Shuvalov stated the documents Navalny had posted were legitimate, but that the transaction had not violated Russian law. "I unswervingly followed the rules and principles of conflict of interest," said Shuvalov. "For a lawyer, this is sacred".[159] In July, Navalny posted documents on his blog allegedly showing that Alexander Bastrykin, head of the Investigative Committee of Russia, owned an undeclared business in the Czech Republic. The posting was described by the Financial Times as Navalny's "answering shot" for having had his emails leaked during his arrest in the previous month.[42]
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In August 2018, Navalny alleged that Viktor Zolotov stole at least US$29 million from procurement contracts for the National Guard of Russia. Shortly after his allegations against Zolotov, Navalny was imprisoned for staging protests in January 2018. Subsequently, Viktor Zolotov published a video message on 11 September challenging Navalny to a duel and promising to make "good, juicy mincemeat" of him.[161][162]
Medvedev
In March 2017, Navalny published the investigation He Is Not Dimon to You, accusing Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev of corruption. The authorities either ignored the accusation or argued that it was made by a "convicted criminal" and not worth comment. On 26 March, Navalny organised a series of anti-corruption rallies in cities across Russia. In some cities, the rallies were sanctioned by authorities, but in others, including Moscow and Saint Petersburg, they were not allowed. The Moscow police said that 500 people had been detained, but according to the human-rights group OVD-Info, 1,030 people were detained in Moscow alone, including Navalny himself.[163][164] On 27 March, he was fined 20,000 rubles minimum for organising an illegal protest, and jailed for 15 days for resisting arrest.[165]
Putin
On 19 January 2021, two days after he was detained by Russian authorities upon his return to Russia, an investigation by Navalny and the FBK was published accusing President Vladimir Putin of using fraudulently obtained funds to build a massive estate for himself near the town of Gelendzhik in Krasnodar Krai, in what he called "the world's biggest bribe". The estate was first reported on in 2010 after the businessman Sergei Kolesnikov, who was involved in the project, gave details about it. According to Navalny, the estate is 39 times the size of Monaco, with the Federal Security Service (FSB) owning 70 square kilometers of land around the palace, and the estate cost over 100 billion rubles ($1.35 billion) to construct.[167] It also showed aerial footage of the estate via a drone, and a detailed floorplan of the palace that Navalny and the FBK said was given by a contractor, which was compared to photographs from inside the palace that were leaked onto the Internet in 2011. Using the floorplan, computer-generated visualisations of the palace interior were also shown.[6]
This investigation also detailed an elaborate corruption scheme allegedly involving Putin's inner circle that allowed Putin to hide billions of dollars to build the estate. Navalny's team also said that it managed to confirm reporting about Putin's alleged lovers Svetlana Krivonogikh and Alina Kabaeva.[6][168][169][170] Navalny's video on YouTube garnered over 20 million views in less than a day, and over 92 million after a week. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov in a press conference called the investigation a "scam" and said that citizens should "think before transferring money to such crooks".[171]
Putin denied ownership of the palace and the oligarch Arkady Rotenberg, Putin's childhood friend and judo partner, claimed ownership.[172][173]
Criminal cases
Kirovles case
Case
On 30 July 2012, the Investigative Committee charged Navalny with embezzlement. The committee stated that he had conspired to steal timber from Kirovles, a state-owned company in Kirov Oblast, in 2009, while acting as an adviser to Kirov's governor Nikita Belykh.[159][174] Investigators had closed a previous probe into the claims for lack of evidence.[175] Navalny was released on his own recognisance but instructed not to leave Moscow.[176]
Navalny described the charges as "weird" and unfounded.[177] He stated that authorities "are doing it to watch the reaction of the protest movement and of Western public opinion ... So far they consider both of these things acceptable and so they are continuing along this line".[159] His supporters protested before the Investigative Committee offices.[174]
In April 2013, Loeb & Loeb LLP[h] issued "An Analysis of the Russian Federation's prosecutions of Alexei Navalny", a paper detailing Investigative Committee accusations. The paper concludes that "the Kremlin has reverted to misuse of the Russian legal system to harass, isolate and attempt to silence political opponents".[178][179]
Conviction and release
The Kirovles trial commenced in the city of Kirov on 17 April 2013.[180] On 18 July, Navalny was sentenced to five years in jail for embezzlement.[181] He was found guilty of misappropriating about 16 million rubles'[182] ($500,000) worth of lumber from a state-owned company.[183] The sentence read by the judge Sergey Blinov was textually the same as the request of the prosecutor, with the only exception that Navalny was given five years, and the prosecution requested six years.[184]
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Later that evening, the Prosecutor's Office appealed Navalny and Ofitserov jail sentences, arguing that until the higher court affirmed the sentence, the sentence was invalid. The next morning, the appeal was granted. Navalny and Ofitserov were released on 19 July, awaiting the hearings of the higher court.[185] The prosecutor's requested decision was described as "unprecedented" by experts.[who?][186]
Probation
The prison sentence was suspended by a court in Kirov on 16 October 2013, still being a burden for his political future.[187]
Review of the sentence
On 23 February 2016, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Russia had violated Navalny's right to a fair trial, and ordered the government to pay him 56,000 euros in legal costs and damages.[188]
On 16 November 2016, Russia's Supreme Court overturned the 2013 sentence, sending the verdict back to the Leninsky District Court in Kirov for review.[189]
On 8 February 2017, the Leninsky district court of Kirov repeated its sentence of 2013 and charged Navalny with a five-year suspended sentence.[115] Navalny announced that he will pursue the annulment of the sentence that clearly contradicts the decision of ECHR.[190][191]
Yves Rocher case and house arrest
Case
In 2008, Oleg Navalny made an offer to Yves Rocher Vostok, the Eastern European subsidiary of Yves Rocher between 2008 and 2012, to accredit Glavpodpiska, which was created by Navalny, with delivering duties. On 5 August, the parties signed a contract. To fulfill the obligations under the agreement, Glavpodpiska outsourced the task to sub-suppliers, AvtoSAGA and Multiprofile Processing Company (MPC). In November and December 2012, the Investigating Committee interrogated and questioned Yves Rocher Vostok. On 10 December, Bruno Leproux, general director of Yves Rocher Vostok, filed to the Investigative Committee, asking to investigate if the Glavpodpiska subscription company had damaged Yves Rocher Vostok, and the Investigative Committee initiated a case.[192]
The prosecution claimed Glavpodpiska embezzled money by taking duties and then redistributing them to other companies for lesser amounts of money, and collecting the surplus: 26.7 million rubles ($540,000) from Yves Rocher Vostok, and 4.4 million rubles from the MPC. The funds were claimed to be subsequently legalised by transferring them on fictitious grounds from a fly-by-night company to Kobyakovskaya Fabrika Po Lozopleteniyu, a willow weaving company founded by Navalny and operated by his parents.[193][194][195] The Navalnys denied the charges. The Navalny brothers' lawyers claimed the investigators "added phrases like 'bearing criminal intentions' to a description of regular entrepreneurial activity". According to Oleg Navalny's lawyer, Glavpodpiska did not just collect money, it controlled provision of means of transport, execution of orders, collected and expedited production to the carriers, and was responsible before clients for terms and quality of executing orders.[192]
None of the witnesses confirmed that there were any losses, except MPC CEO Sergei Shustov who said he had learned about his losses from an investigator and believed him without making audits. Both brothers and their lawyers claimed Alexei Navalny did not participate in the Glavpodpiska operations, and witnesses all stated they had never encountered Alexei Navalny in person before the trial.[192]
House arrest and limitations
Following the imputed violation of travel restrictions, Navalny was placed under house arrest and prohibited from communicating with anyone other than his family, lawyers, and investigators on 28 February 2014.[196][197] Navalny claimed the arrest was politically motivated, and he filed a complaint to the European Court of Human Rights. On 7 July, he declared the complaint had been accepted and given priority; the court compelled the Government of Russia to provide answers to a questionnaire.[198]
The house arrest, in particular, prohibited usage of the internet; however, new posts were released under his social media accounts after the arrest was announced. A 5 March post claimed the accounts were controlled by his Anti-Corruption Foundation teammates and his wife Yulia. On 13 March, his LiveJournal blog was blocked in Russia, because, according to the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology, and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor), "functioning of the given web page breaks the regulation of the juridical decision of the bail hearing of a citizen against whom a criminal case has been initiated".[199]
The house arrest was eased a number of times: On 21 August, Navalny was allowed to communicate with his co-defendants;[200] a journalist present in the courthouse at the moment confirmed Navalny was allowed to communicate with "anyone but the Yves Rocher case witnesses".[201] On 10 October, his right to communicate with the press was confirmed by another court, and he was allowed to make comments on the case in media (Navalny's plea not to prolong the arrest was, however, rejected).[202] On 19 December, he was allowed to mail correspondence to authorities and international courts. Navalny again pleaded not to prolong the arrest, but the plea was rejected again.[203]
Conviction
The verdict was announced on 30 December 2014. Both brothers were found guilty of fraud against Multiprofile Processing Company (MPC) and Yves Rocher Vostok and money laundering, and were convicted under Articles 159.4 §§ 2 and 3 and 174.1 § 2 (a) and (b) of the Criminal Code.[204] Alexei Navalny was given 31⁄2 years of suspended sentence, and Oleg Navalny was sentenced to 31⁄2 years in prison and was arrested after the verdict was announced;[205] both had to pay a fine of 500,000 rubles and a compensation to the MPC of over 4 million rubles.[206] In the evening, several thousand protesters gathered in the center of Moscow. Navalny broke his house arrest to attend the rally and was immediately apprehended by the police and brought back home.[207]
Both brothers filed complaints to the European Court of Human Rights: Oleg's was communicated and given priority; Alexei's was reviewed in the context of the previous complaint related to this case and the Government of Russia had been "invited to submit further observations".[208] The second instance within the country confirmed the verdict, only releasing Alexei from the responsibility to pay his fine. Both prosecutors and defendants were not satisfied with this decision.[206]
ECHR
On 17 October 2017, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Navalny's conviction for fraud and money laundering "was based on an unforeseeable application of criminal law and that the proceedings were arbitrary and unfair." The Court found that the domestic court's decisions had been arbitrary and manifestly unreasonable. ECHR found the Russian courts' decisions violated articles 6 and 7 of the European Convention on Human Rights.[209][210] On 15 November 2018, the Grand Chamber upheld the decision.[211]
Indemnification
After the Yves Rocher case, Navalny had to pay a compensation of 4.4 million rubles. He declared the case was "a frame up", but he added he would pay the sum as this could affect granting his brother's parole.[212] On 7 October 2015, Alexei's lawyer announced the defendant willingly paid 2.9 million and requested an installment plan for the rest of the sum.[213] The request was granted, except the term was contracted from the requested five months to two,[214] and a part of the sum declared paid (900,000 rubles; arrested from Navalny's banking account) was not yet received by the police; the prosecutors declared that may happen because of inter-process delays.[215]
Later that month, Kirovles sued Navalny for the 16.1 million rubles' declared pecuniary injury; Navalny declared he had not expected the suit, as Kirovles did not initiate it during the 2012–2013 trial. On 23 October, a court resolved the said sum should be paid by the three defendants.[216] The court denied the defendants' motion 14.7 million had already been paid by that point; the verdict and the payment sum were justified by a ruling by a Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation.[217] Navalny declared he could not cover the requested sum; he called the suit a "drain-dry strategy" by authorities.[216]
Other cases
In late December 2012, the Investigative Committee of Russia asserted that Allekt, an advertising company headed by Navalny, defrauded the Union of Right Forces (SPS) political party in 2007 by taking 100 million rubles ($3.2 million) payment for advertising and failing to honor its contract. If charged and convicted, Navalny could be jailed for up to 10 years. Leonid Gozman, a former SPS official, was quoted as saying: "Nothing of the sort happened—he committed no robbery". Earlier in December, as reported by the BBC, "the Investigative Committee charged ... Navalny and his brother Oleg with embezzling 55 million rubles ($1.76 million) in 2008–2011 while working in a postal business." Navalny, who denied the allegations in the two previous cases, sought to laugh off news of the third inquiry with a tweet stating "Fiddlesticks".[218] In April 2020, Yandex search engine started artificially placing negative commentary about Navalny on the top positions in its search results for his name.[219] Yandex declared this was part of an "experiment" and returned to presenting organic search results.[220][221][222]
Navalny alleged that Russian billionaire and businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin was linked to a company called Moskovsky Shkolnik (Moscow schoolboy) that had supplied poor quality food to schools which had caused a dysentery outbreak.[223][224] In April 2019, Moskovsky Shkolnik filed a lawsuit against Navalny. In October 2019, the Moscow Arbitration Court ordered Navalny to pay 29.2 million rubles. Navalny said that "Cases of dysentery were proven using documents. But it's us that has to pay."[225] By April 2019, Navalny had won six complaints against Russian authorities in the ECHR for a total of €225,000.[226] Prigozhin was quoted by the press service of his catering company Concord Management and Consulting on 25 August 2020 as saying that he intended to enforce a court decision that required Navalny, his associate Lyubov Sobol and his Anti-Corruption Foundation to pay 88 million rubles in damages to the Moskovsky Shkolnik company over a video investigation.[227]
Poisoning and recovery
On 20 August 2020, Navalny fell ill during a flight from Tomsk to Moscow and was hospitalised in the Emergency City Clinical Hospital No. 1 in Omsk (Городская клиническая больница скорой медицинской помощи №1), where the plane had made an emergency landing. The change in his condition on the plane was sudden and violent, and video footage showed crewmembers on the flight scurrying towards him as he screamed loudly.[228] Later, he said that he was not screaming from pain, but from the knowledge that he was dying.[229]
Navalny's spokeswoman, Kira Yarmysh, later said that he was in a coma and on a ventilator in the Omsk hospital. She also said that since he arose that morning, Navalny had consumed nothing but a cup of tea, acquired at the airport. It was initially suspected that something was mixed into his drink, and physicians stated that a "toxin mixed into a hot drink would be rapidly absorbed". The hospital said that he was in a stable but serious condition. Although staff initially acknowledged that Navalny had probably been poisoned, after numerous police personnel appeared outside Navalny's room, the medical staff was less forthcoming. The Omsk hospital's deputy chief physician later told reporters that poisoning was "one scenario among many" being considered.[228]
A plane was sent from Germany to evacuate Navalny from Russia for treatment at the Charité Hospital in Berlin. Although the doctors treating him in Omsk initially declared he was too sick to be transported,[230] they later released him.[231][232] On 24 August, the doctors in Germany made an announcement, confirming that Navalny had been poisoned with a cholinesterase inhibitor.[233]
Ivan Zhdanov, chief of Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation, said that Navalny could have been poisoned because of one of the foundation's investigations.[223] On 2 September, the German government announced that Navalny was poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent, from the same family of nerve agents that was used to poison Sergei Skripal and his daughter. International officials said that they had obtained "unequivocal proof" from toxicology tests, and have called on the Russian government for an explanation.[234][235][236] On 7 September, German doctors announced that he was out of the coma.[237] On 15 September, Navalny's spokeswoman said that Navalny would return to Russia.[238]
On 17 September, Navalny's team said that traces of the nerve agent used to poison Navalny was detected on an empty water bottle from his hotel room in Tomsk, suggesting that he was possibly poisoned before leaving the hotel.[239] On 23 September, Navalny was discharged from hospital after his condition had sufficiently improved.[240] On 6 October, OPCW confirmed presence of cholinesterase inhibitor from the Novichok group in Navalny's blood and urine samples.[241][242][243]
On 14 December, a joint investigation by The Insider and Bellingcat in co-operation with CNN and Der Spiegel was published, which implicated agents from Russia's Federal Security Service (FSB) in Navalny's poisoning.[244][245][246] The investigation detailed a special unit of the FSB, which specialises in chemical substances, and the investigators then tracked members of the unit, using telecom and travel data. According to the investigation, Navalny was under surveillance by a group of operatives from the unit for 3 years and there may have been earlier attempts to poison Navalny.[247][248][249][250] In an interview with Spanish newspaper El País, Navalny said that "It is difficult for me to understand exactly what is going on in [Putin's] mind. ... 20 years of power would spoil anyone and make them crazy. He thinks he can do whatever he wants."[251]
On 21 December 2020, Navalny released a video showing him impersonating a Russian security official and speaking over the phone with a man identified by some investigative news media as a chemical weapons expert named Konstantin Kudryavtsev. During the call, he revealed that the poison had been placed on Navalny's clothing, particularly in his underwear, and that Navalny would have died if not for the plane's emergency landing and quick response from an ambulance crew on the runway.[252]
In January 2021, Bellingcat, The Insider and Der Spiegel linked the unit that tracked Navalny to other deaths, including activists Timur Kuashev in 2014 and Ruslan Magomedragimov in 2015, and politician Nikita Isayev in 2019.[253] In February, another joint investigation found that Russian opposition politician Vladimir Kara-Murza was followed by the same unit before his suspected poisonings.[254]
The European Union, United Kingdom and United States responded to the poisoning by imposing sanctions on senior Russian officials.[255][256][257][258]
Imprisonment
Yves Rocher case
On 17 January 2021, Navalny returned to Russia by plane from Germany, arriving at Sheremetyevo International Airport in Moscow after the flight was diverted from Vnukovo Airport. At passport control, he was detained. The Federal Penitentiary Service (FSIN) confirmed his detention and said that he would remain in custody until the court hearing.[259] Prior to his return, the FSIN had said that Navalny might face jail time upon his arrival in Moscow for violating the terms of his probation by leaving Russia, saying it would be "obliged" to detain him once he returned;[260] in 2014, Navalny received a suspended sentence in the Yves Rocher case, which he called politically motivated and in 2017, the European Court of Human Rights ruled that Navalny was unfairly convicted.[261][262] Amnesty International declared Navalny to be a prisoner of conscience and called on the Russian authorities to release him.[263]
A court decision on 18 January 2021 ordered the detention of Navalny until 15 February for violating his parole.[264][265][260] A makeshift court was set up in the police station where Navalny was being held. Another hearing would later be held to determine whether his suspended sentence should be replaced with a jail term.[266] Navalny described the procedure as "ultimate lawlessness" and called on his supporters to take to the streets.[267] The next day, while in jail, an investigation by Navalny and the FBK was published accusing President Vladimir Putin of corruption.[268] The investigation and his arrest led to mass protests across Russia beginning on 23 January 2021.[269][270]
A Moscow court on 2 February 2021 replaced Navalny's three and a half-year suspended sentence with a prison sentence, minus the amount of time he spent under house arrest, meaning he would spend over 21⁄2 years in a corrective labour colony.[271][272][273][274][275][excessive citations] The verdict was condemned by the governments of the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, France and others as well as the EU.[273][276][277][278][279][280][excessive citations] Immediately after the verdict was announced, protests in a number of Russian cities were held and met with a harsh police crackdown.[281] Navalny later returned to court for a trial on slander charges, where he was accused of defaming a World War II veteran who took part in a promotional video backing the constitutional amendments last year. The case was launched in June 2020 after Navalny called those who took part in the video "corrupt lackeys" and "traitors". Navalny called the case politically motivated and accused authorities of using the case to smear his reputation. Although the charge is punishable by up to two years in prison if proven, his lawyer said that Navalny cannot face a custodial sentence because the law was changed to make it a jailable offence after the alleged crime had taken place.[282][283]
The European Court of Human Rights ruled on 16 February 2021 that the Russian government should release Navalny immediately, with the court saying that the resolution was made in "regard to the nature and extent of risk to the applicant's life". Navalny's lawyers had applied to the court for an "interim measure" for his release on 20 January 2021 after his detention. However Russian officials indicated that they would not comply with the decision. Justice Minister Konstantin Chuychenko called the measure a "flagrant intervention in the operation of a judicial system of a sovereign state" as well as "unreasonable and unlawful", claiming that it did not "contain any reference to any fact or any norm of the law, which would have allowed the court to take this decision". In December 2020, a series of laws were also passed and signed that gave the constitution precedence over rulings made by international bodies as well international treaties.[284][285][286][287] A few days later, a Moscow court rejected Navalny's appeal and upheld his prison sentence, however it reduced his sentence by six weeks after deciding to count his time under house arrest as part of his time served. Another court convicted Navalny on slander charges against the World War II veteran, fining him 850,000 rubles ($11,500).[288]
A resolution by the ECHR called for his release.[289]
Navalny was reported on 28 February 2021 to have recently arrived at the Pokrov correctional colony in Vladimir Oblast, a prison where Dmitry Demushkin and Konstantin Kotov were also jailed.[290][291][292] In early March 2021, the European Union and United States imposed sanctions on senior Russian officials in response to Navalny's poisoning and imprisonment.[258]
In March 2021, Navalny in a formal complaint accused authorities of torture by depriving him of sleep, where authorities consider him a flight risk. Navalny told lawyers that guards wake him up eight times a night announcing to a camera that he was in his prison cell. A lawyer of Navalny said that he was suffering from health problems, including a loss of sensation in his spine and legs, and that prison authorities denied Navalny's requests for a civilian physician, claiming his health was "satisfactory".[293][294] On 31 March 2021, Navalny announced a hunger strike to demand proper medical treatment.[295] On 6 April 2021, six doctors, including Navalny's personal physician, Anastasia Vasilyeva, and two CNN correspondents, were arrested outside the prison when they attempted to visit Navalny whose health significantly deteriorated.[296][297] On 7 April 2021, Navalny's attorneys claimed he had suffered two spinal disc herniations and had lost feeling in his hands, prompting criticism from the U.S. government.[298][299] Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International accused Vladimir Putin of slowly killing Alexei Navalny through torture and inhumane treatment in prison.[300][301] He also complained that he was not allowed to read newspapers or have any books including a copy of the Quran that he planned to study.[302]
On 17 April 2021, it was reported that Navalny was in immediate need of medical attention. Navalny's personal doctor Anastasia Vasilyeva and three other doctors, including cardiologist Yaroslav Ashikhmin, asked prison officials to grant them immediate access, stating on social media that "our patient can die any minute", due to an increased risk of a fatal cardiac arrest or kidney failure "at any moment".[303][304] Test results obtained by Navalny's lawyers showed heightened levels of potassium in the blood, which can bring on cardiac arrest, and sharply elevated creatinine levels, indicating impaired kidneys. Navalny's results showed blood potassium levels of 7.1 mmol (millimoles) per liter; blood potassium levels higher than 6.0 mmol per liter usually require immediate treatment.[305][306] Later that night, an open letter, addressed to Putin and open for Russian citizens to sign, was signed and published by 11 politicians representing several regional parliaments, demanding an independent doctor be allowed to visit Navalny, and for a review and cancellation of all of his criminal cases. "We regard what is happening in relation to Navalny as an attempt on the life of a politician, committed out of personal and political hatred," said the letter, "You, the President of the Russian Federation, personally bear responsibility for the life of Alexey Navalny on the territory of the Russian Federation, including in prison facilities – [you bear this responsibility] to Navalny himself, to his relatives, and to the whole world."[307] Among the signatories were chairman of the Pskov Oblast branch of the Yabloko party, the deputy of the regional assembly Lev Schlossberg, the deputy from Karelia, the ex-chairman of Yabloko Emilia Slabunova, and the deputy of the Moscow City Duma Yevgeny Stupin.[308]
The following day, his daughter called on Russian prison authorities to let her father be checked by doctors in a tweet[309] written from Stanford University, where she is a student. Prominent celebrities such as J.K. Rowling and Jude Law also addressed a letter[310] to Russian authorities asking to provide Navalny with proper medical treatment.[311][312] U.S. president Joe Biden called his treatment "totally unfair" and National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said that the Kremlin had been warned "that there will be consequences if Mr. Navalny dies."[313] The European Union's head diplomat Josep Borrell stated that the organisation held the Russian government accountable for Navalny's health conditions. The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, also expressed her concern for his health.[314] However, Russian authorities rebuked such concerns by foreign countries. Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said that Russian prison officials are monitoring Navalny's health, not the president.[315]
On 19 April 2021, Navalny was moved from prison to a hospital for convicts, according to the Russian prison service,[316][314] for "vitamin therapy".[315] On 23 April 2021, Navalny announced that he was ending his hunger strike on advice of his doctors and as he felt his demands had been partially met.[317][318] As of June 2021, his newspapers were still being censored as articles were cut out.[319]
Designation as extremist
On 16 April 2021, the Moscow prosecutor office requested the Moscow City Court to designate organisations linked to Navalny including the FBK and his headquarters as extremist organisations, claiming: "Under the disguise of liberal slogans, these organisations are engaged in creating conditions for the destabilisation of the social and socio-political situation."[320] In response, Navalny aide Leonid Volkov stated: "Putin has just announced full-scale mass political repression in Russia."[321]
On 26 April 2021, Moscow's prosecutor office ordered Navalny's network of regional offices, including those of the FBK, to cease its activities, pending a court ruling on whether to designate them as extremist organisations. Volkov explained that it will limit many of the group's activities as prosecutors seek to label the Foundation as "extremists".[322][323] The move was condemned by Germany as well as Amnesty International, which, in a statement, said: "The objective is clear: to raze Alexei Navalny's movement to the ground while he languishes in prison."[324] On 29 April 2021, Navalny's team announced that the political network would be dissolved, in advance of a court ruling in May expected to designate it as extremist.[325] According to Volkov, the headquarters would be transformed into independent political organisations "which will deal with investigations and elections, public campaigns and rallies".[326] On the same day, his allies said that a new criminal case had been opened against Navalny, for allegedly setting up a non-profit organisation that infringed on the rights of citizens.[327] The next day, the leader of Team 29, Ivan Pavlov, who also represents Navalny's team in the extremism case, was detained in Moscow.[328] On 30 April, the financial monitoring agency added Navalny's regional campaign offices to a list of "terrorists and extremists."[329] On 20 May, the head of the Russian prison system and Navalny's ally Ivan Zhdanov reported that Navalny had "more or less" recovered and that his health was generally satisfactory.[330] On 7 June, Navalny was returned to prison after fully recovering from the effects of the hunger strike.[331]
On 9 June 2021, Navalny's political network, including his headquarters and the FBK, were designated as extremist organisations and liquidated by the Moscow City Court.[332][333] Vyacheslav Polyga, judge of Moscow City Court, upheld the administrative claim of the prosecutor of Moscow city Denis Popov and, rejecting all the petitions of the defense, decided[334] to recognise Anti-Corruption Foundation as extremist organisation, to liquidate it and to confiscate its assets; similar decision had been taken against Citizens' Rights Protection Foundation; the activity of the Alexei Navalny staff was prohibited (case No.3а-1573/2021).[335] Case hearing was held in camera because, as indicated by advocate Ilia Novikov, the case file including the text of the administrative claim was classified as state secret.[336] According to advocate Ivan Pavlov, Navalny was not the party to the proceedings and the judge refused to give him such status; at the hearing, the prosecutor stated that defendants are extremist organisations because they want the change of power in Russia and they promised to help participants of the protest with payment of administrative and criminal fines and with making a complaints to the European Court of Human Rights.[337] On 4 August 2021, First Appellate Ordinary Court in Moscow upheld the decision of the court of first instance (case No.66а-3553/2021) and this decision entered into force that day.[338] On 28 December 2021, it was reported that Anti-Corruption Foundation, Citizens' Rights Protection Foundation and 18 natural persons including Alexei Navalny filed a cassation appeals to the Second Cassation Ordinary Court.[339] On 25 March 2022, the Second Cassation Ordinary Court rejected all cassation appeals and upheld the judgements of lower courts (case No.8а-5101/2022).[340]
In October 2021, Navalny said that the Russian prison commission designated him as a "terrorist" and "extremist", but that he was no longer regarded as a flight risk.[341] In January 2022, Russia added him and his aides to the "terrorists and extremists" list.[342][343] On 28 June 2022, Navalny lost his appeal on being designated as "extremist" and "terrorist".[344]
Later charges
In February 2022, Alexei Navalny faced an additional 10 to 15 years in prison in a new trial on fraud and contempt of court charges.[345][346] The charges alleged that he stole $4.7m (£3.5m) of donations given to his political organisations and insulted a judge.[347][346] He was tried in a makeshift courtroom in the corrective colony at which he was imprisoned.[348] Amnesty International independently analysed the trial materials calling the charges "arbitrary" and "politically motivated".[349]
On 21 February 2022, prosecution witness Fyodor Gorozhanko refused to testify against Navalny in the trial, stating that investigators had "pressured" him to testify to the information they wanted and that he did not believe Navalny had committed any crimes.[350] On 24 February, during his trial, Navalny condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine that began that day and asked the court to include his statement to the trial's protocol. He said that it would "lead to a huge number of victims, destroyed futures, and the continuation of this line of impoverishment of the citizens of Russia." He called the war a distraction to the population to "divert their attention from problems that exist inside the country".[351]
On 22 March 2022, Navalny was found guilty of contempt of court and embezzlement and given a 9-year sentence in a maximum-security prison; he was also ordered to pay a fine of 1.2 million rubles (approx. $13,000).[352] Amnesty International described the trial as a "sham".[7]
On 17 May 2022, Navalny opened an appeal process against the sentence; the court said the process would resume on 24 May after Navalny requested to postpone the hearing to have a family meeting before being transferred.[353] On 24 May, the Moscow City Court upheld the judgement of the court of first instance.[354]
On 31 May 2022, Navalny said that he was officially notified about new charges of extremism brought against him, in which he was facing up to an additional 15 years in prison.[355]
In mid-June 2022, Navalny was transferred to the maximum security prison IK-6 in Melekhovo, Vladimir Oblast.[356][357]
On 11 July 2022, Navalny announced the relaunch of his Anti-Corruption Foundation as an international organisation with an advisory board including his wife Yulia Navalnaya, Guy Verhofstadt, Anne Applebaum, and Francis Fukuyama; Navalny also stated that the first contribution to Anti-Corruption Foundation International would be the Sakharov Prize ($50,000) that was awarded to him.[358]
On 7 September 2022, Navalny said that he had been placed in solitary confinement for the fourth time in just over a month, after just being released. He linked his recent treatment to his attempts to establish a labour union in his penal colony and his "6000" list of individuals he has called to be sanctioned.[359] The next day, he said that his attorney-client privilege was revoked with prison authorities accusing him of continuing to commit crimes from prison.[360]
On 4 October 2022, allies of Navalny said they were relaunching his regional political network to fight the mobilization and war.[361]
On 17 November 2022, Navalny stated that he was now in permanent solitary confinement. Infractions besides the attempt to start a labour union among the prisoners were that he did not button his collar, did not clean the prison yard well enough, and that he addressed a prison official by his military rank rather than his patronymic.[362]
On 10 January 2023, over 400 doctors in Russia signed an open letter to president Putin demanding that prison authorities "stop abusing" Navalny, after it became known that he fell ill with flu in solitary confinement and his lawyers were not allowed to give him basic medication.[363] Less than a month later, Navalny was transferred to an isolated punishment cell, a stricter form of imprisonment reserved for those who violate prison rules, for the maximum term of six months.[364][365]
On 4 August 2023, Navalny was sentenced to an additional 19 years in a "special regime" colony on charges including publicly inciting extremist activity, financing extremist activity, and "rehabilitating Nazi ideology"; the Moscow City Court found him guilty on all charges in a closed-doors trial.[366] In a social media post published the previous day, Navalny stated that he had expected to be given a "Stalinist" sentence and called on supporters to fight against corruption.[367] According to his lawyers, following this latest sentencing, Navalny would have been released in December 2038.[368]
On 13 October 2023, three of his lawyers, Vadim Kobzev, Igor Sergunin and Alexei Liptser, were detained on charges about participating in an "extremist group". Navalny commented that "Just like in Soviet times, not only political activists are being prosecuted and turned into political prisoners, but their lawyers, too".[369]
In IK-3 "special regime" colony
On 11 December 2023, Navalny's aides revealed that they had not had any contact with Navalny for six days. According to their statements, he was removed from the penal colony where he had been imprisoned and his current whereabouts are not known. The disappearance came after Navalny was sentenced to an additional 19 years in August and the beginning of campaigning for the 2024 Russian presidential election, which Putin recently announced his candidacy for. Navalny's aides had been preparing for his transfer to a "special regime" colony (the harshest grade in Russia's prison system).[370] His last known whereabouts was the IK-6 prison camp in Vladimir Oblast, where on 15 December staff commented that Navalny had left the facility and was being moved to a different prison.[371][372] On 25 December 2023 he was discovered to be in the IK-3 "special regime" colony, known as "Polar Wolf", in Kharp in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Okrug.[11][373][374] He remained there until his death on 16 February 2024.[375][376]
Political prisoner status
Human Rights Centre Memorial recognised Navalny as a political prisoner in 2021.[377][378] PACE also considered Navalny a political prisoner.[379]
Death
On 16 February 2024, the Federal Penitentiary Service announced that Navalny had died at the prison in Yamalo-Nenets in Western Siberia after taking a walk and feeling unwell that morning. He reportedly died at 14:17 Yekaterinburg Time. The prison statement stated: "All necessary resuscitation measures were carried out but did not yield positive results... The paramedics confirmed the death of the convict."[376][380] Kira Yarmysh, Navalny's spokeswoman, confirmed his death the following day, and demanded his body to be returned to his family.[381] Prior to his death, Navalny had been treated in a hospital after complaining of malnourishment and other ailments due to mistreatment in the prison.[382] His body was returned to his mother on the 24th of February.[383]
Reception
Political activities
In October 2010, Navalny was the winner of an online poll for the mayor of Moscow, held by Kommersant and Gazeta.Ru.[384][385] He received about 30,000 votes, or 45%, with the closest rival being "Against all candidates" with some 9,000 votes (14%), followed by former First Deputy Prime Minister of Russia Boris Nemtsov with 8,000 votes (12%) out of a total of about 67,000 votes.[386]
The reaction to Navalny's actual mayoral election result in 2013, where he came second, was mixed: Nezavisimaya Gazeta declared, "The voting campaign turned a blogger into a politician",[89] and following an October 2013 Levada Center poll that showed Navalny made it to the list of potential presidential candidates among Russians, receiving a rating of 5%, Konstantin Kalachev, the leader of the Political Expert Group, declared 5% was not the limit for Navalny, and unless something extraordinary happened, he could become "a pretender for a second place in the presidential race".[387] On the other hand, The Washington Post published a column by Milan Svolik that stated the election was fair so the Sobyanin could show a clean victory, demoralising the opposition, which could otherwise run for street protests.[388] Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov stated on 12 September, "His momentary result cannot testify his political equipment and does not speak of him as of a serious politician".[389]
When referring to Navalny, Putin never actually pronounced his name in public, referring to him as a "mister" or the like;[390][389] Julia Ioffe took it for a sign of weakness before the opposition politician,[391] and Peskov later stated Putin never pronounced his name in order not to "give [Navalny] a part of his popularity".[392] In July 2015, Bloomberg's sources "familiar with the matter" declared there was an informal prohibition from the Kremlin for senior Russian officials from mentioning Navalny's name.[393] Peskov rejected the assumption there is such a ban; however, in doing so, he did not mention Navalny's name either.[394]
Ratings
In a 2013 Levada Center poll, Navalny's recognition among the Russian population stood at 37%.[395] Out of those who were able to recognise Navalny, 14% would either "definitely" or "probably" support his presidential run.[396]
The Levada Center also conducted another survey, which was released on 6 April 2017, showing Navalny's recognition among the Russian population at 55%.[397] Out of those who recognised Navalny, 4% would "definitely" vote for him and 14% would "probably" vote for him in the presidential election.[397] In another poll carried out by the same pollster in August 2020, 4% of respondents said that they trusted Navalny the most (out of a list of politicians), an increase from 2% in the previous month.[398]
According to polls conducted by the Levada Center in September 2020, 20% of Russians approved of Navalny's activities, 50% disapproved, and 18% had never heard of him.[399] Out of those who were able to recognise Navalny, 10% said that they have "respect" for him, 8% had sympathy and 15% "could not say anything bad" about him. 31% were "neutral" towards him, 14% "could not say anything good" about him and 10% disliked him.[400][399]
Criminal cases
During and after the Kirovles trial, a number of prominent people expressed support to Navalny and/or condemned the trial. The last Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev called it "proof that we do not have independent courts".[401] Former Minister of Finance Alexei Kudrin stated that it was "looking less like a punishment than an attempt to isolate him from social life and the electoral process".[402] It was also criticised by novelist Boris Akunin,[403] and jailed Russian oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who called it similar to the treatment of political opponents during the Soviet era.[402]
Vladimir Zhirinovsky, leader of the nationalist LDPR, called the verdict "a direct warning to our 'fifth column'", and added, "This will be the fate of everyone who is connected with the West and works against Russia".[402] A variety of state officials condemned the verdict. United States Department of State Deputy Spokesperson Marie Harf stated that the United States was "very disappointed by the conviction and sentencing of opposition leader Aleksey Navalniy".[404] The spokesperson for European Union High Representative Catherine Ashton said that the outcome of the trial "raises serious questions as to the state of the rule of law in Russia".[402][405] Andreas Schockenhoff, Germany's Commissioner for German-Russian Coordination, stated, "For us, it's further proof of authoritarian policy in Russia, which doesn't allow diversity and pluralism".[406] The New York Times commented in response to the verdict that "President Vladimir Putin of Russia actually seems weak and insecure".[401]
The verdict in the case of Yves Rocher caused similar reactions. According to Alexei Venediktov, the verdict was "unfair", Oleg Navalny was taken "hostage", while Alexei was not jailed to avoid "furious reaction" from Putin, which was caused by the change of measure of restraint after the Kirovles trial.[407] A number of deputies appointed by United Russia and LDPR found the verdict too mild.[408] Experts interviewed by the BBC Russian Service expressed reactions close to the political positions their organisations generally stand on.[409] The spokesperson for EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini stated the same day that the sentence was likely to be politically motivated.[207]
Public opinion varied over time. According to Levada Center, 20% of people thought the Kirovles case had been caused by an actual violation of law, while 54% agreed the rationale beyond the case was his anti-corruption activity in May 2011. In May 2013, the shares of people who held these opinions were 28% and 47%, respectively. In September 2013, the shares were 35% and 45%. The organisation suggested this had been caused by corresponding coverage in media.[410] By September 2014, the percentages had undergone further changes, and equaled 37% and 38%.[411] The center also stated the share of those who found the result of another criminal case against him was unfair and Navalny was not guilty dropped from 13% in July 2013 to 5% in January 2015, and the number of those who found the verdict was too tough also fell from 17% to 9%. The share of those who found the verdict to be either fair or too mild was 26% in July 2013, and has exceeded 35% since September 2013.[411]
Political positions
Navalny was described as "Putin's fiercest political opponent, using the street and the internet to expose secret palaces and to galvanise Russians who otherwise saw no alternative to the president."[412] Therefore, his political views were of significant public interest and covered in a number of publications.
Corruption
In February 2011, in an interview with the radio station finam.fm, Navalny called the main Russian party, United Russia, a "party of crooks and thieves".[413] In May 2011, the Russian government began a criminal investigation into Navalny, widely described in media as "revenge", and by Navalny himself as "a fabrication by the security services".[413][414][415] Meanwhile, "party of crooks and thieves" became a popular slogan among the opposition.[416]
Nationalism
His views about Russian nationalism evolved over time. In 2011, Navalny stated that he considered himself a "nationalist democrat".[417][418] He previously participated in the "Russian march" from 2006, a parade uniting Russian nationalist groups of all stripes,[419][420][421] and was one of the co-organisers of the 2011 march.[422][423][420] Navalny has also called for ending federal subsidies to the "corrupt" and "ineffective" governments of Chechnya and other republics part of the North Caucasus.[419][424][425]
Immigration
In 2007, Navalny co-founded the National Russian Liberation Movement, known as NAROD (The People), which sets immigration policy as a priority.[426] The movement allied itself with two nationalist groups, the Movement Against Illegal Immigration and Great Russia.[427] In the same year, he released several anti-immigration videos,[428][429][430][431] including one where he advocated the deportation of migrants.[432] In one of the videos, in which he advocates for gun rights, he compares militants from the Caucasus to cockroaches and mimics shooting one who attempts to "attack" him.[433][434] According to Leonid Volkov, Navalny later regretted making the 2007 video.[435]
In 2013, after ethnic riots in a Moscow district took place, which were sparked by a murder committed by a migrant, Navalny sympathised with the anti-immigration movement and commented that ethnic tensions and crimes are inevitable because of failing immigration policies by the state.[436][437] However, he later said that "The basis of my approach is that you have to communicate with nationalists and educate them... I think it's very important to explain to them that the problem of illegal immigration is not solved by beating up migrants but by other, democratic means".[438]
Since 2016, Navalny deemphasized his past statements on the immigration.[439] In 2021, Alexander Verkhovskiy, head of the Moscow-based SOVA hate crimes monitor said that Navalny's statements on immigration were 'a long time ago'.[412]
Same-sex marriage
In 2017, Leonid Volkov, Navalny's chief of staff, said that Navalny's team supports the legalisation of same-sex marriage.[440]
Foreign policy
His views on foreign policy evolved over time.[435] Previously, Navalny was described as "shar[ing] the establishment view that Russia is entitled to a say in the domestic affairs of its post-Soviet neighbors", and supported the expansion of the Eurasian Economic Union. He also called on Russia to recognise and militarily support Abkhazia and South Ossetia in 2008, following the Russo-Georgian War.[441] He later apologized for his comments about Georgia.[435] In 2017, Navalny stated that Russia should recognize the independence of Transnistria as it was already de facto independent from Moldova, saying that he had already supported this in 2008.[442]
In June 2020, he spoke out in support of the Black Lives Matter protests against racism.[443][444]
Syria
In 2016, Navalny spoke against the Russian intervention in the Syrian civil war, believing that there are internal problems in Russia that need to be dealt with rather than to get involved in foreign wars.[445] He also said Russia should not "try to save Assad, who represents a military junta", and said entering the war in the same side as the Shia Islamist Iran and Hezbollah stoked anger among Russia's predominantly Sunni Muslim community.[446]
Ukraine
In early 2012, Navalny said he supported the independence of the Ukrainian state and that Russia, Ukraine and Belarus are "natural allies" who should enhance their economic and political integration.[447]
In March 2014, after Russia's annexation of Crimea, Navalny urged further sanctions against officials and businessmen linked to Putin and proposed his own list of sanctions, saying that previous US and EU sanctions were "mocked".[448] In October 2014, Navalny suggested that the fate of Crimea should be resolved by holding a new and fair referendum.[449] Navalny also said that Putin's government should stop "sponsoring the war" in Donbas.[449] Navalny has strongly criticised Vladimir Putin's policies in Ukraine: "Putin likes to speak about the 'Russian world' but he is actually making it smaller. In Belarus, they sing anti-Putin songs at football stadiums; in Ukraine they simply hate us. In Ukraine now, there are no politicians who do not have extreme anti-Russian positions. Being anti-Russian is the key to success now in Ukraine, and that is our fault".[450]
In 2018, after the establishment of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, an event labelled as the ending of more than three centuries of Russian spiritual and temporal control of the dominant faith in Ukraine, Navalny tweeted: "What took centuries to create has been destroyed by Putin and his idiots in four years ... Putin is the enemy of the Russian World."[451][452]
In February 2022, Navalny compared the recognition of the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic by Russia to when Soviet leaders deployed troops to Afghanistan in 1979, describing both events as a distraction to the population from real issues. He said that he believed that while Putin will not allow Ukraine to develop, Russia will pay the same price, and that Putin needed to be removed to save Russia.[453]
On 2 March 2022, Navalny urged Russian citizens to stage daily protests against Russia's invasion of Ukraine, saying Russia should not be a "nation of frightened people" and "cowards who pretend not to notice the aggressive war" launched by "our insane tsar".[454][455][456]
On 5 April 2022, referring to war crimes that took place in Ukraine, Navalny said the "monstrosity of lies" in the Russian state media "is unimaginable. And, unfortunately, so is its persuasiveness for those who have no access to alternative information."[457] He tweeted that "warmongers" among Russian state media personalities "should be treated as war criminals. From the editors-in-chief to the talk show hosts to the news editors, [they] should be sanctioned now and tried someday."[458] The next month, Navalny called the invasion a "stupid war" based on lies.[459]
Navalny criticised the 2022 Russian mobilisation.[460] During a court hearing on 21 September, he said: "I don't understand one thing. The army has a million people, Rosgvardia has 350,000 people, the Interior Ministry has another million and a half or two million people, and the Federal Penitentiary Service is full of people. Why are they drafting civilians?"[461] In another court hearing two days later, Navalny said: "You won't shut my mouth with your ShIZO [punishment cell]. This is a crime against my country. I don't relate to it, and I won't be silent. I hope that everyone else who hears me will not be silent about it. Because what's happening now is much more terrible than any 12 or 112 days in a ShIZO [punishment cell]. This is a historic crime, this is involving hundreds of thousands of people in this crime".[462][463]
On 20 February 2023, he condemned Putin for "destroying" Russia's own future "just to make our country look bigger on the map" and said that Russia must end its occupation of Ukraine and recognise Ukraine's borders as they were established in 1991 after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Navalny also said Russia would have to pay post-war reparations to Ukraine and called for an international investigation into war crimes, saying: "Tens of thousands of innocent Ukrainians have been murdered and pain and suffering have befallen millions more."[464]
On 1 February 2024, Navalny and his allies called on supporters to protest President Vladimir Putin and the invasion of Ukraine during the third day of the 2024 Russian presidential election by all going to vote against Putin at the same time.[465]
Awards and honours
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Navalny was named "Person of the Year 2009" by Russian business newspaper Vedomosti[466][467] and by stock exchange observer Stock in Focus.[468]
On 22 April 2010, Navalny was awarded the Finance magazine prize in the nomination "for protecting the rights of minority shareholders".[469][470]
Navalny was a World Fellow at Yale University's World Fellows Program, aimed at "creating a global network of emerging leaders and to broaden international understanding" in 2010.[471]
In 2011, Foreign Policy magazine named Navalny to the FP Top 100 Global Thinkers, along with Daniel Domscheit-Berg and Sami Ben Gharbia of Tunisia, for "shaping the new world of government transparency".[472] FP picked him again in 2012.[473] He was listed by Time magazine in 2012 as one of the world's 100 most influential people, the only Russian on the list.[474] In 2013, Navalny came in at No. 48 among "world thinkers" in an online poll by the UK magazine Prospect.[475]
In 2015, Alexei and Oleg Navalny were chosen to receive the "Prize of the Platform of European Memory and Conscience 2015". According to the platform's statement, "The Members of the Platform have voted this year for the Navalny brothers, in recognition of their personal courage, struggle and sacrifices for upholding fundamental democratic values and freedoms in the Russian Federation today. By the award of the Prize, the Platform wishes to express its respect and support to Mr. Oleg Navalny whom the Platform considers a political prisoner, and to Mr. Alexei Navalny for his efforts to expose corruption, defend political pluralism and opposition to the mounting authoritarian regime in the Russian Federation".[476]
In June 2017, Navalny was included in Time's list of the World's 25 Most Influential People on the Internet.[477] In December 2017, he was named "Politician of the Year 2017" by Vedomosti.[478][479]
He was named "Politician of the Year 2019" by readers of Vedomosti.[480]
Navalny was nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize by multiple Norwegian members of parliament.[481][482] An Internet petition to the Nobel Committee in support of Navalny's candidacy was signed by over 38,000 people.[483]
Following Navalny's imprisonment in February 2021, the Boris Nemtsov Foundation for Freedom awarded Navalny with the Boris Nemtsov Prize for Courage.[484] A scenic viewpoint of Alexei Navalny was also set in Prague in direct view from the Russian Embassy, near Boris Nemtsov Square in front of the Russian Embassy and the Anna Politkovskaya Promenade.[485][486]
On 8 June 2021, Navalny's daughter accepted the Moral Courage Award at the Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy on behalf of her father. Navalny dedicated the prize to political prisoners.[487] In September 2021, Navalny was included in Time's list of the 100 most influential people. This was his second appearance on the list, having previously been included in 2012.[488]
In September 2021, he was awarded the Knight of Freedom Award conferred by the Casimir Pulaski Foundation.[489][490][491]
In October 2021, he received the Sakharov Prize, the European Parliament's annual human rights prize.[492] David Sassoli, the President of the European Parliament, announced that the award was to recognise that Navalny "has fought tirelessly against the corruption of Vladimir Putin's regime. This cost him his liberty and nearly his life".[493]
Later that same year, he also received a German prize for his efforts in sustaining freedom of expression – the M100 Media Award.[494][491]
In 2023, the documentary film about him, Navalny, directed by Daniel Roher, won Best Documentary at the 76th British Academy Film Awards and Best Documentary Feature at the 95th Academy Awards.[495][496][497]
Family and personal life
Navalny was married to Yulia Abrosimova and had two children, daughter Darya (Dasha) Navalnaya, who began undergraduate studies at Stanford University in September 2019, and son Zakhar.[498]
Starting 1998, he lived primarily in a three-room apartment in Maryino District in southeast Moscow.[499]
Navalny was originally an atheist, but later became a member of the Russian Orthodox Church. He has said that turning to the Orthodox church has made him feel a "part of something large and universal."[500]
On 17 January 2021, Navalny was again arrested as he was returning to Russia, after having had to leave the country for medical treatment in Germany for a poisoning attempt against his life that had recently occurred in Russia.[234] He remained incarcerated (initially in the IK-2 penal colony) and was housed in the IK-6 maximum security prison in Melekhovo, Vladimir Oblast.[501][502][348] Navalny was listed by Amnesty International (AI) as a prisoner of conscience in May 2021, meaning that AI held that Navalny's incarceration was primarily due to his political beliefs.[503]
In addition to his native Russian, Navalny also spoke English.[504][505][506]
Books and publications
- Opposing Forces: Plotting the New Russia (8 December 2016)[507]
- "Vladimir Putin: The 100 Most Influential People of 2022", Time 100, Time, 23 May 2022[508]
See also
- 2017–2018 Russian protests
- 2019 Moscow protests
- 2021 Russian protests
- List of designated prisoners of conscience
- List of people who survived assassination attempts
- List of solved missing person cases
- List of prison deaths
Explanatory notes
- ^ Previously known as the People's Alliance (2012–2014) and the Progress Party (2014–2018)
- ^ Arrested and subsequently imprisoned
- ^ In this name that follows Eastern Slavic naming customs, the patronymic is Anatolyevich and the family name is Navalny.
- ^ Sometimes transliterated as Alexey, Aleksei or Aleksey.
- ^ The Russian word "да" (da) means "yes".
- ^ Argued as following: "It is clearly stated in the preamble of our declaration that the Yabloko Party thoroughly and sharply opposes any national and racial discord and any xenophobia. However, in this case, when we know ... that the Constitution guarantees us the right to gather peacefully and without a weapon, we see that in these conditions the prohibition of the Russian March as it was announced, provokes the organisers to some activities that could end not so well. Thus we appeal to the Moscow City Hall ... for permission."[31]
- ^ Article 15, section 7: "Terms, as provided by sections 4 and 6 of the present article, are prolonged if a territorial body has passed a verdict of suspension of state registration of a regional branch of a political party, as provided by section 5.1 of the present article, or a verdict of denial of state registration of a regional branch of a political party has been challenged to a court and, as of the day of expiration of the said terms, has not gone into effect."[58] The following section is given as in force as on 2 April 2012 (the section had not changed by 1 May 2015).
- ^ Loeb & Loeb LLP, founded by Joseph P. Loeb et al.. LLP stands for Limited liability partnership.
- Exchange rates used in the article
- ^ According to the exchange rates set by the Central Bank of Russia for 8 September 2013.[85]
Vladimir Putin
Vladimir PutinВладимир Путин 
Putin in 2023President of Russia Assumed office
7 May 2012Prime Minister Preceded by Dmitry Medvedev In office
7 May 2000 – 7 May 2008
Acting: 31 December 1999 – 7 May 2000Prime Minister Preceded by Boris Yeltsin Succeeded by Dmitry Medvedev Prime Minister of Russia In office
8 May 2008 – 7 May 2012President Dmitry Medvedev First Deputy - Sergei Ivanov
- Viktor Zubkov
- Igor Shuvalov
Preceded by Viktor Zubkov Succeeded by Viktor Zubkov (acting) In office
9 August 1999 – 7 May 2000President Boris Yeltsin First Deputy - Nikolai Aksyonenko
- Viktor Khristenko
- Mikhail Kasyanov
Preceded by Sergei Stepashin Succeeded by Mikhail Kasyanov Additional positionsPersonal details Born Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin
7 October 1952
Leningrad, Russian SFSR, Soviet UnionPolitical party Independent
(1991–1995, 2001–2008, 2012–present)Other political
affiliations- All-Russia People's Front (2011–present)
- United Russia[1] (2008–2012)
- Unity (1999–2001)
- Our Home – Russia (1995–1999)
- CPSU (1975–1991)
Spouse [a] Children At least 2, Maria and Katerina[b] Relatives Putin family Residence(s) Novo-Ogaryovo, Moscow Alma mater Awards Full list Signature 
Website eng .putin .kremlin .ru Military service Allegiance Soviet Union RussiaBranch/service Years of service - 1975–1991
- 1997–1999
- 2000–present
Rank Commands Supreme Commander-in-Chief Battles/wars 
This article is part ofVladimir Putin
a series about- Political offices
- President of Russia (2000–2008; 2012–present)
Prime Minister of Russia (1999–2000; 2008–2012)
- Policies
- Elections
- Inaugurations
- International trips
- Political groups
- Opposition
- Speeches
- Summits
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin[c][d] (born 7 October 1952) is a Russian politician and former intelligence officer who has been President of Russia since 2012. Putin has held continuous positions as president or prime minister since 1999:[e] as prime minister from 1999 to 2000 and from 2008 to 2012, and as president from 2000 to 2008.[f][7] He is the longest-serving Russian or Soviet leader since Joseph Stalin.
Putin worked as a KGB foreign intelligence officer for 16 years, rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel before resigning in 1991 to begin a political career in Saint Petersburg. In 1996, he moved to Moscow to join the administration of President Boris Yeltsin. He briefly served as the director of the Federal Security Service (FSB) and then as secretary of the Security Council of Russia before being appointed prime minister in August 1999. Following Yeltsin's resignation, Putin became acting president and, in less than four months, was elected to his first term as president. He was subsequently reelected in 2004. Due to constitutional limitations of two consecutive presidential terms, Putin served as prime minister again from 2008 to 2012 under Dmitry Medvedev. He returned to the presidency in 2012, following an election marked by allegations of fraud and protests, and was reelected in 2018. In April 2021, after a referendum, he signed into law constitutional amendments that included one allowing him to run for reelection twice more, potentially extending his presidency to 2036.[8][9]
During Putin's initial presidential tenure, the Russian economy grew on average by seven percent per year,[10] driven by economic reforms and a fivefold increase in the price of oil and gas.[11][12] Additionally, Putin led Russia in a conflict against Chechen separatists, reestablishing federal control over the region.[13][14] While serving as prime minister under Medvedev, he oversaw a military conflict with Georgia and enacted military and police reforms. In his third presidential term, Russia annexed Crimea and supported a war in eastern Ukraine through several military incursions, resulting in international sanctions and a financial crisis in Russia. He also ordered a military intervention in Syria to support his ally Bashar al-Assad during the Syrian civil war, ultimately securing permanent naval bases in the Eastern Mediterranean.[15][16][17] In his fourth presidential term, he launched a significant invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, which prompted international condemnation and led to expanded sanctions. In September 2022, he announced a partial mobilization and forcibly annexed four Ukrainian oblasts into Russia. In March 2023, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin for war crimes[18] related to his alleged criminal responsibility for illegal child abductions during the war.[19]
Under Putin's leadership, Russia has undergone democratic backsliding and a shift towards authoritarianism. His rule has been marked by endemic corruption and widespread human rights violations, including the imprisonment and suppression of political opponents, intimidation and censorship of independent media in Russia, and a lack of free and fair elections.[20][21][22] Putin's Russia has consistently received low scores on Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index, The Economist Democracy Index, Freedom House's Freedom in the World index, and the Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom Index. Putin is the longest-serving Russian president and the second-longest-serving European president, following Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus.
Early life
Putin was born on 7 October 1952 in Leningrad, Soviet Union (now Saint Petersburg, Russia),[23] the youngest of three children of Vladimir Spiridonovich Putin (1911–1999) and Maria Ivanovna Putina (née Shelomova; 1911–1998). His grandfather, Spiridon Putin (1879–1965), was a personal cook to Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin.[24][25] Putin's birth was preceded by the deaths of two brothers: Albert, born in the 1930s, died in infancy, and Viktor, born in 1940, died of diphtheria and starvation in 1942 during the Siege of Leningrad by Nazi Germany's forces in World War II.[26][27]
Putin's mother was a factory worker, and his father was a conscript in the Soviet Navy, serving in the submarine fleet in the early 1930s. During the early stage of Nazi German invasion of the Soviet Union, his father served in the destruction battalion of the NKVD.[28][29][30] Later, he was transferred to the regular army and was severely wounded in 1942.[31] Putin's maternal grandmother was killed by the German occupiers of Tver region in 1941, and his maternal uncles disappeared on the Eastern Front during World War II.[32]
Education
On 1 September 1960, Putin started at School No. 193 at Baskov Lane, near his home. He was one of a few in his class of about 45 pupils who were not yet members of the Young Pioneer organization. At the age of 12, he began to practise sambo and judo.[33] In his free time, he enjoyed reading the works of Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, and Lenin.[34] Putin studied German at Saint Petersburg High School 281 and speaks both German and English as additional languages.[35]
Putin c. 1960s Putin studied law at the Leningrad State University named after Andrei Zhdanov (now Saint Petersburg State University) in 1970 and graduated in 1975.[36] His thesis was on "The Most Favored Nation Trading Principle in International Law".[37] While there, he was required to join the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU); he remained a member until it ceased to exist in 1991.[38] Putin met Anatoly Sobchak, an assistant professor who taught business law,[g] and who later became the co-author of the Russian constitution and of corruption schemes in France. Putin was influential in Sobchak's career in Saint Petersburg, and Sobchak was influential in Putin's career in Moscow.[39]
In 1997, he received a degree in economics (kandidat ekonomicheskikh nauk) at the Saint Petersburg Mining University for a thesis on energy dependencies and their instrumentalisation in foreign policy.[40][41] His supervisor was Vladimir Litvinenko, who in 2000 and again in 2004 managed his presidential election campaigns in St Petersburg.[42] Danchenko and Gaddy[who?]consider Putin to be a plagiarist according to Western standards. One book from which he copied entire paragraphs is the Russian-language edition of King and Cleland's Strategic Planning and Policy (1978).[42] Balzer wrote on the Putin thesis and Russian energy policy and concludes along with Olcott that "The primacy of the Russian state in the country’s energy sector is non-negotiable", and cites the insistence on majority Russian ownership of any joint-venture, particularly since BASF signed the Gazprom Nord Stream-Yuzhno-Russkoye deal in 2004 with a 49-51 structure, as opposed to the older 50-50 split of British Petroleum's TNK-BP project.[43]
KGB career
Putin in the KGB, c. 1980 In 1975, Putin joined the KGB and trained at the 401st KGB School in Okhta, Leningrad.[44][45] After training, he worked in the Second Chief Directorate (counterintelligence), before he was transferred to the First Chief Directorate, where he monitored foreigners and consular officials in Leningrad.[44][46][47] In September 1984, Putin was sent to Moscow for further training at the Yuri Andropov Red Banner Institute.[48][49][50]
Multiple reports have suggested Putin was sent by the KGB to New Zealand, corroborated through New Zealand eyewitness accounts and government records. This has never been confirmed by Russian security services. Former Waitākere City mayor Bob Harvey and former prime minister David Lange alleged that Putin served in Wellington and Auckland.[51] He allegedly worked for some time undercover as a Bata shoe salesman in central Wellington.[51][52][53]
From 1985 to 1990, he served in Dresden, East Germany,[54] using a cover identity as a translator.[55] While posted in Dresden, Putin worked as one of the KGB's liaison officers to the Stasi secret police and was reportedly promoted to lieutenant colonel. According to the official Kremlin presidential site, the East German communist regime commended Putin with a bronze medal for "faithful service to the National People's Army". Putin has publicly conveyed delight over his activities in Dresden, once recounting his confrontations with anti-communist protestors of 1989 who attempted the occupation of Stasi buildings in the city.[56]
"Putin and his colleagues were reduced mainly to collecting press clippings, thus contributing to the mountains of useless information produced by the KGB", Russian-American Masha Gessen wrote in their 2012 biography of Putin.[55] His work was also downplayed by former Stasi spy chief Markus Wolf and Putin's former KGB colleague Vladimir Usoltsev. Journalist Catherine Belton wrote in 2020 that this downplaying was actually cover for Putin's involvement in KGB coordination and support for the terrorist Red Army Faction, whose members frequently hid in East Germany with the support of the Stasi. Dresden was preferred as a "marginal" town with only a small presence of Western intelligence services.[57] According to an anonymous source who claimed to be a former RAF member, at one of these meetings in Dresden the militants presented Putin with a list of weapons that were later delivered to the RAF in West Germany. Klaus Zuchold, who claimed to be recruited by Putin, said that Putin handled a neo-Nazi, Rainer Sonntag, and attempted to recruit an author of a study on poisons.[57] Putin reportedly met Germans to be recruited for wireless communications affairs together with an interpreter. He was involved in wireless communications technologies in South-East Asia due to trips of German engineers, recruited by him, there and to the West.[47] However, a 2023 investigation by Der Spiegel reported that the anonymous source had never been an RAF member and "considered a notorious fabulist" with "several previous convictions, including for making false statements."[58]
The Stasi identity card of Vladimir Putin, who worked in Dresden as a KGB liaison officer to the Stasi[59] According to Putin's official biography, during the fall of the Berlin Wall that began on 9 November 1989, he saved the files of the Soviet Cultural Center (House of Friendship) and of the KGB villa in Dresden for the official authorities of the would-be united Germany to prevent demonstrators, including KGB and Stasi agents, from obtaining and destroying them. He then supposedly burnt only the KGB files, in a few hours, but saved the archives of the Soviet Cultural Center for the German authorities. Nothing is told about the selection criteria during this burning; for example, concerning Stasi files or about files of other agencies of the German Democratic Republic or of the USSR. He explained that many documents were left to Germany only because the furnace burst but many documents of the KGB villa were sent to Moscow.[60]
After the collapse of the Communist East German government, Putin was to resign from active KGB service because of suspicions aroused regarding his loyalty during demonstrations in Dresden and earlier, though the KGB and the Soviet Army still operated in eastern Germany. He returned to Leningrad in early 1990 as a member of the "active reserves", where he worked for about three months with the International Affairs section of Leningrad State University, reporting to Vice-Rector Yuriy Molchanov, while working on his doctoral dissertation.[47]
There, he looked for new KGB recruits, watched the student body, and renewed his friendship with his former professor, Anatoly Sobchak, soon to be the Mayor of Leningrad.[61] Putin claims that he resigned with the rank of lieutenant colonel on 20 August 1991,[61] on the second day of the 1991 Soviet coup d'état attempt against Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev.[62] Putin said: "As soon as the coup began, I immediately decided which side I was on", although he noted that the choice was hard because he had spent the best part of his life with "the organs".[63]
Political career
1990–1996: Saint Petersburg administration
In May 1990, Putin was appointed as an advisor on international affairs to the mayor of Leningrad Anatoly Sobchak. In a 2017 interview with Oliver Stone, Putin said that he resigned from the KGB in 1991, following the coup against Mikhail Gorbachev, as he did not agree with what had happened and did not want to be part of the intelligence in the new administration.[64] According to Putin's statements in 2018 and 2021, he may have worked as a private taxi driver to earn extra money, or considered such a job.[65][66]
Putin, Lyudmila Narusova and Ksenia Sobchak at the funeral of Putin's former mentor[67] Anatoly Sobchak, Mayor of Saint Petersburg (1991–1996) On 28 June 1991, he became head of the Committee for External Relations of the Mayor's Office, with responsibility for promoting international relations and foreign investments[68] and registering business ventures. Within a year, Putin was investigated by the city legislative council led by Marina Salye. It was concluded that he had understated prices and permitted the export of metals valued at $93 million in exchange for foreign food aid that never arrived.[69][36] Despite the investigators' recommendation that Putin be fired, Putin remained head of the Committee for External Relations until 1996.[70][71] From 1994 to 1996, he held several other political and governmental positions in Saint Petersburg.
In March 1994, Putin was appointed as first deputy chairman of the Government of Saint Petersburg. In May 1995, he organized the Saint Petersburg branch of the pro-government Our Home – Russia political party, the liberal party of power founded by Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin. In 1995, he managed the legislative election campaign for that party, and from 1995 through June 1997, he was the leader of its Saint Petersburg branch.
1996–1999: Early Moscow career
In June 1996, Sobchak lost his bid for re-election in Saint Petersburg, and Putin, who had led his election campaign, resigned from his positions in the city administration. He moved to Moscow and was appointed as deputy chief of the Presidential Property Management Department headed by Pavel Borodin. He occupied this position until March 1997. He was responsible for the foreign property of the state and organized the transfer of the former assets of the Soviet Union and the CPSU to the Russian Federation.[39]
Putin as FSB director, 1998 On 26 March 1997, President Boris Yeltsin appointed Putin deputy chief of the Presidential Staff, a post which he retained until May 1998, and chief of the Main Control Directorate of the Presidential Property Management Department (until June 1998). His predecessor in this position was Alexei Kudrin and his successor was Nikolai Patrushev, both future prominent politicians and Putin's associates.[39] On 3 April 1997, Putin was promoted to 1st class Active State Councillor of the Russian Federation — the highest federal state civilian service rank.[72]
On 27 June 1997, at the Saint Petersburg Mining Institute, guided by rector Vladimir Litvinenko, Putin defended his Candidate of Science dissertation in economics, titled Strategic Planning of the Reproduction of the Mineral Resource Base of a Region under Conditions of the Formation of Market Relations.[73] This exemplified the custom in Russia whereby a young rising official would write a scholarly work in mid-career.[74] Putin's thesis was plagiarized.[75] Fellows at the Brookings Institution found that 15 pages were copied from an American textbook.[76][77]
On 25 May 1998, Putin was appointed First Deputy Chief of the Presidential Staff for the regions, in succession to Viktoriya Mitina. On 15 July, he was appointed head of the commission for the preparation of agreements on the delimitation of the power of the regions and head of the federal center attached to the president, replacing Sergey Shakhray. After Putin's appointment, the commission completed no such agreements, although during Shakhray's term as the head of the Commission 46 such agreements had been signed.[78] Later, after becoming president, Putin cancelled all 46 agreements.[39] On 25 July 1998, Yeltsin appointed Putin director of the Federal Security Service (FSB), the primary intelligence and security organization of the Russian Federation and the successor to the KGB.[79] In 1999, Putin described communism as "a blind alley, far away from the mainstream of civilization".[80]
1999: First premiership
Putin with President Boris Yeltsin on 31 December 1999, when Yeltsin announced his resignation On 9 August 1999, Putin was appointed one of three first deputy prime ministers, and later on that day, was appointed acting prime minister of the Government of the Russian Federation by President Yeltsin.[81] Yeltsin also announced that he wanted to see Putin as his successor. Later on that same day, Putin agreed to run for the presidency.[82]
On 16 August, the State Duma approved his appointment as prime minister with 233 votes in favor (vs. 84 against, 17 abstained),[83] while a simple majority of 226 was required, making him Russia's fifth prime minister in fewer than eighteen months. On his appointment, few expected Putin, virtually unknown to the general public, to last any longer than his predecessors. He was initially regarded as a Yeltsin loyalist; like other prime ministers of Boris Yeltsin, Putin did not choose ministers himself, his cabinet was determined by the presidential administration.[84]
Yeltsin's main opponents and would-be successors were already campaigning to replace the ailing president, and they fought hard to prevent Putin's emergence as a potential successor. Following the September 1999 Russian apartment bombings and the invasion of Dagestan by mujahideen, including the former KGB agents, based in the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria, Putin's law-and-order image and unrelenting approach to the Second Chechen War soon combined to raise his popularity and allowed him to overtake his rivals.
While not formally associated with any party, Putin pledged his support to the newly formed Unity Party,[85] which won the second largest percentage of the popular vote (23.3%) in the December 1999 Duma elections, and in turn supported Putin.
1999–2000: Acting presidency
On 31 December 1999, Yeltsin unexpectedly resigned and, according to the Constitution of Russia, Putin became Acting President of the Russian Federation. On assuming this role, Putin went on a previously scheduled visit to Russian troops in Chechnya.[86]
The first presidential decree that Putin signed on 31 December 1999 was titled "On guarantees for the former president of the Russian Federation and the members of his family".[87][88] This ensured that "corruption charges against the outgoing President and his relatives" would not be pursued.[89] This was most notably targeted at the Mabetex bribery case in which Yeltsin's family members were involved. On 30 August 2000, a criminal investigation (number 18/238278-95) in which Putin himself,[90][91] as a member of the Saint Petersburg city government, was one of the suspects, was dropped.
On 30 December 2000, yet another case against the prosecutor general was dropped "for lack of evidence", despite thousands of documents having been forwarded by Swiss prosecutors.[92] On 12 February 2001, Putin signed a similar federal law which replaced the decree of 1999. A case regarding Putin's alleged corruption in metal exports from 1992 was brought back by Marina Salye, but she was silenced and forced to leave Saint Petersburg.[93]
While his opponents had been preparing for an election in June 2000, Yeltsin's resignation resulted in the presidential elections being held on 26 March 2000; Putin won in the first round with 53% of the vote.[94][95]
2000–2004: First presidential term
Putin taking the presidential oath beside Boris Yeltsin, May 2000 The inauguration of President Putin occurred on 7 May 2000. He appointed the minister of finance, Mikhail Kasyanov, as prime minister.[96] The first major challenge to Putin's popularity came in August 2000, when he was criticized for the alleged mishandling of the Kursk submarine disaster.[97] That criticism was largely because it took several days for Putin to return from vacation, and several more before he visited the scene.[97]
Between 2000 and 2004, Putin set about the reconstruction of the impoverished condition of the country, apparently winning a power-struggle with the Russian oligarchs, reaching a 'grand bargain' with them. This bargain allowed the oligarchs to maintain most of their powers, in exchange for their explicit support for—and alignment with—Putin's government.[98][99]
Putin with Tom Brokaw before an interview on 2 June 2000 The Moscow theater hostage crisis occurred in October 2002. Many in the Russian press and in the international media warned that the deaths of 130 hostages in the special forces' rescue operation during the crisis would severely damage President Putin's popularity. However, shortly after the siege had ended, the Russian president enjoyed record public approval ratings—83% of Russians declared themselves satisfied with Putin and his handling of the siege.[100]
In 2003, a referendum was held in Chechnya, adopting a new constitution which declares that the Republic of Chechnya is a part of Russia; on the other hand, the region did acquire autonomy.[101] Chechnya has been gradually stabilized with the establishment of the Parliamentary elections and a Regional Government.[102][103] Throughout the Second Chechen War, Russia severely disabled the Chechen rebel movement; however, sporadic attacks by rebels continued to occur throughout the northern Caucasus.[104]
2004–2008: Second presidential term
Putin with Junichiro Koizumi, Jacques Chirac, Gerhard Schröder, George W. Bush and other state leaders in Moscow during the Victory Day parade, 9 May 2005[105] On 14 March 2004, Putin was elected to the presidency for a second term, receiving 71% of the vote.[106] The Beslan school hostage crisis took place on 1–3 September 2004; more than 330 people died, including 186 children.[107]
The near 10-year period prior to the rise of Putin after the dissolution of Soviet rule was a time of upheaval in Russia.[108] In a 2005 Kremlin speech, Putin characterized the collapse of the Soviet Union as the "greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the Twentieth Century."[109] Putin elaborated, "Moreover, the epidemic of disintegration infected Russia itself."[110] The country's cradle-to-grave social safety net was gone and life expectancy declined in the period preceding Putin's rule.[111] In 2005, the National Priority Projects were launched to improve Russia's health care, education, housing, and agriculture.[112][113]
The continued criminal prosecution of the wealthiest man in Russia at the time, president of Yukos oil and gas company Mikhail Khodorkovsky, for fraud and tax evasion was seen by the international press as a retaliation for Khodorkovsky's donations to both liberal and communist opponents of the Kremlin.[114] Khodorkovsky was arrested, Yukos was bankrupted, and the company's assets were auctioned at below-market value, with the largest share acquired by the state company Rosneft.[115] The fate of Yukos was seen as a sign of a broader shift of Russia towards a system of state capitalism.[116][117] This was underscored in July 2014, when shareholders of Yukos were awarded $50 billion in compensation by the Permanent Arbitration Court in The Hague.[118]
On 7 October 2006, Anna Politkovskaya, a journalist who exposed corruption in the Russian army and its conduct in Chechnya, was shot in the lobby of her apartment building, on Putin's birthday. The death of Politkovskaya triggered international criticism, with accusations that Putin had failed to protect the country's new independent media.[119][120] Putin himself said that her death caused the government more problems than her writings.[121]
In a January 2007 meeting with Angela Merkel, Putin brought in his Labrador in front of the German Chancellor, who has a phobia of dogs. In January 2007, Putin met with German Chancellor Angela Merkel at his Black Sea residence in Sochi, two weeks after Russia switched off oil supplies to Germany. Putin brought his black Labrador Konni in front of Merkel, who has a noted phobia of dogs and looked visibly uncomfortable in its presence, adding "I'm sure it will behave itself", causing a furor among the German press corps.[122][123] When asked about the incident in a January 2016 interview with Bild, Putin claimed he was not aware of her phobia, adding "I wanted to make her happy. When I found out that she did not like dogs, I of course apologized."[124] Merkel later told a group of reporters "I understand why he has to do this — to prove he's a man. He's afraid of his own weakness. Russia has nothing, no successful politics or economy. All they have is this.[123]
Putin, Bill Clinton, George H. W. Bush and Lyudmila Putina at the state funeral of Boris Yeltsin in Moscow, April 2007 In a speech in February 2007 at the Munich Security Conference, Putin complained about the feeling of insecurity engendered by the dominant position in geopolitics of the United States, and observed that a former NATO official had made rhetorical promises not to expand into new countries in Eastern Europe.
On 14 July 2007, Putin announced that Russia would suspend implementation of its Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe obligations, effective after 150 days,[125][126] and suspend its ratification of the Adapted Conventional Armed Forces in Europe Treaty, which treaty was shunned by NATO members abeyant Russian withdrawal from Transnistria and the Republic of Georgia. Moscow continued to participate in the joint consultative group, because it hoped that dialogue could lead to the creation of an effective, new conventional arms control regime in Europe.[127] Russia did specify steps that NATO could take to end the suspension. "These include [NATO] members cutting their arms allotments and further restricting temporary weapons deployments on each NATO member's territory. Russia also want[ed] constraints eliminated on how many forces it can deploy in its southern and northern flanks. Moreover, it is pressing NATO members to ratify a 1999 updated version of the accord, known as the Adapted CFE Treaty, and demanding that the four alliance members outside the original treaty, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Slovenia, join it."[126]
In early 2007, "Dissenters' Marches" were organized by the opposition group The Other Russia,[128] led by former chess champion Garry Kasparov and national-Bolshevist leader Eduard Limonov. Following prior warnings, demonstrations in several Russian cities were met by police action, which included interfering with the travel of the protesters and the arrests of as many as 150 people who attempted to break through police lines.[129]
On 12 September 2007, Putin dissolved the government upon the request of Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov. Fradkov commented that it was to give the President a "free hand" in the run-up to the parliamentary election. Viktor Zubkov was appointed the new prime minister.[130]
On 19 September 2007 Putin's nuclear-capable bombers commenced exercises near the US, for the first time since the downfall of the USSR.[131]
In December 2007, United Russia—the governing party that supports the policies of Putin—won 64.24% of the popular vote in their run for State Duma according to election preliminary results.[132] United Russia's victory in the December 2007 elections was seen by many as an indication of strong popular support of the then Russian leadership and its policies.[133][134]
On 11 February 2008 while Putin addressed the 15th anniversary party of Gazprom, its employees threatened Ukraine with a stoppage of flow.[131]
On 4 April 2008 at the NATO Bucharest summit, invitee Putin told George W. Bush and other conference delegates: "We view the appearance of a powerful military bloc on our border as a direct threat to the security of our nation. The claim that this process is not directed against Russia will not suffice. National security is not based on promises."[131]
2008–2012: Second premiership
Putin with Dmitry Medvedev, March 2008 Putin was barred from a third consecutive term by the Constitution. First Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev was elected his successor. In a power-switching operation on 8 May 2008, only a day after handing the presidency to Medvedev, Putin was appointed Prime Minister of Russia, maintaining his political dominance.[135]
Putin has said that overcoming the consequences of the world economic crisis was one of the two main achievements of his second premiership.[113] The other was stabilizing the size of Russia's population between 2008 and 2011 following a long period of demographic collapse that began in the 1990s.[113] It was during this premiership that the 2009 Russia–Ukraine gas dispute occurred, and Putin controlled the Gazprom chess-board, according to Andriy Kobolyev, who was then an advisor to the CEO of the Ukrainian Naftogaz utility. Putin observed at a German trade show in 2010 that if his hosts did not want Russia's natural gas nor nuclear power they could always heat with wood, and for that they would need to log Siberia.[131]
At the United Russia Congress in Moscow on 24 September 2011, Medvedev officially proposed that Putin stand for the presidency in 2012, an offer Putin accepted. Given United Russia's near-total dominance of Russian politics, many observers believed that Putin was assured of a third term. The move was expected to see Medvedev stand on the United Russia ticket in the parliamentary elections in December, with a goal of becoming prime minister at the end of his presidential term.[136]
After the parliamentary elections on 4 December 2011, tens of thousands of Russians engaged in protests against alleged electoral fraud, the largest protests in Putin's time. Protesters criticized Putin and United Russia and demanded annulment of the election results.[137] Those protests sparked the fear of a colour revolution in society.[138] Putin allegedly organized a number of paramilitary groups loyal to himself and to the United Russia party in the period between 2005 and 2012.[139]
2012–2018: Third presidential term
Nikolai Patrushev is believed to be one of the closest advisors to Putin. On 24 September 2011, while speaking at the United Russia party congress, Medvedev announced that he would recommend the party nominate Putin as its presidential candidate. He also revealed that the two men had long ago cut a deal to allow Putin to run for president in 2012.[140] This switch was termed by many in the media as "Rokirovka", the Russian term for the chess move "castling".[141]
On 4 March 2012, Putin won the 2012 Russian presidential election in the first round, with 63.6% of the vote, despite widespread accusations of vote-rigging.[142][143][144] Opposition groups accused Putin and the United Russia party of fraud.[145] While efforts to make the elections transparent were publicized, including the usage of webcams in polling stations, the vote was criticized by the Russian opposition and by international observers from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe for procedural irregularities.[146]
Anti-Putin protests took place during and directly after the presidential campaign. The most notorious protest was the Pussy Riot performance on 21 February, and subsequent trial.[147] An estimated 8,000–20,000 protesters gathered in Moscow on 6 May,[148][149] when eighty people were injured in confrontations with police,[150] and 450 were arrested, with another 120 arrests taking place the following day.[151] A counter-protest of Putin supporters occurred which culminated in a gathering of an estimated 130,000 supporters at the Luzhniki Stadium, Russia's largest stadium.[152] Some of the attendees stated that they had been paid to come, were forced to come by their employers, or were misled into believing that they were going to attend a folk festival instead.[153][154][155] The rally is considered to be the largest in support of Putin to date.[156]
Putin at a bilateral meeting with U.S. president Barack Obama during the G8 summit in Ireland, 17 June 2013 Putin's presidency was inaugurated in the Kremlin on 7 May 2012.[157] On his first day as president, Putin issued 14 presidential decrees, which are sometimes called the "May Decrees" by the media, including a lengthy one stating wide-ranging goals for the Russian economy. Other decrees concerned education, housing, skilled labor training, relations with the European Union, the defense industry, inter-ethnic relations, and other policy areas dealt with in Putin's program articles issued during the presidential campaign.[158]
In 2012 and 2013, Putin and the United Russia party backed stricter legislation against the LGBT community, in Saint Petersburg, Archangelsk, and Novosibirsk; a law called the Russian gay propaganda law, that is against "homosexual propaganda" (which prohibits such symbols as the rainbow flag,[159][160] as well as published works containing homosexual content) was adopted by the State Duma in June 2013.[161][162] Responding to international concerns about Russia's legislation, Putin asked critics to note that the law was a "ban on the propaganda of pedophilia and homosexuality" and he stated that homosexual visitors to the 2014 Winter Olympics should "leave the children in peace" but denied there was any "professional, career or social discrimination" against homosexuals in Russia.[163]
In June 2013, Putin attended a televised rally of the All-Russia People's Front where he was elected head of the movement,[164] which was set up in 2011.[165] According to journalist Steve Rosenberg, the movement is intended to "reconnect the Kremlin to the Russian people" and one day, if necessary, replace the increasingly unpopular United Russia party that currently backs Putin.[166]
Annexation of Crimea
Crimea (dark green), rest of Ukraine (light green) and Russia (light red) in Europe 
Putin in Normandy Format talks with Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko, German chancellor Angela Merkel and French president François Hollande, 17 October 2014 In February 2014, Russia made several military incursions into Ukrainian territory. After the Euromaidan protests and the fall of Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych, Russian soldiers without insignias took control of strategic positions and infrastructure within the Ukrainian territory of Crimea. Russia then annexed Crimea and Sevastopol after a referendum in which, according to official results, Crimeans voted to join the Russian Federation.[167][168][169] Subsequently, demonstrations against Ukrainian Rada legislative actions by pro-Russian groups in the Donbas area of Ukraine escalated into the Russo-Ukrainian War between the Ukrainian government and the Russia-backed separatist forces of the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People's Republics. In August 2014,[170] Russian military vehicles crossed the border in several locations of Donetsk Oblast.[171][172][173] The incursion by the Russian military was seen by Ukrainian authorities as responsible for the defeat of Ukrainian forces in early September.[174][175]
In October 2014, Putin addressed Russian security concerns in Sochi at the Valdai International Discussion Club.
In November 2014, the Ukrainian military reported intensive movement of troops and equipment from Russia into the separatist-controlled parts of eastern Ukraine.[176] The Associated Press reported 80 unmarked military vehicles on the move in rebel-controlled areas.[177] An OSCE Special Monitoring Mission observed convoys of heavy weapons and tanks in DPR-controlled territory without insignia.[178] OSCE monitors further stated that they observed vehicles transporting ammunition and soldiers' dead bodies crossing the Russian-Ukrainian border under the guise of humanitarian-aid convoys.[179]
As of early August 2015, the OSCE observed over 21 such vehicles marked with the Russian military code for soldiers killed in action.[180] According to The Moscow Times, Russia has tried to intimidate and silence human-rights workers discussing Russian soldiers' deaths in the conflict.[181] The OSCE repeatedly reported that its observers were denied access to the areas controlled by "combined Russian-separatist forces".[182]
In October 2015, The Washington Post reported that Russia had redeployed some of its elite units from Ukraine to Syria in recent weeks to support Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.[183] In December 2015, Putin admitted that Russian military intelligence officers were operating in Ukraine.[184]
The Moscow Times quoted pro-Russian academic Andrei Tsygankov as saying that many members of the international community assumed that Putin's annexation of Crimea had initiated a completely new kind of Russian foreign policy[185][186] and that his foreign policy had shifted "from state-driven foreign policy" to taking an offensive stance to recreate the Soviet Union. In July 2015, he opined that this policy shift could be understood as Putin trying to defend nations in Russia's sphere of influence from "encroaching western power".[187]
Intervention in Syria
Putin meets with U.S. president Barack Obama in New York City to discuss Syria and ISIL, 29 September 2015 
Putin with Syrian president Bashar al-Assad in 2017 On 30 September 2015, President Putin authorized Russian military intervention in the Syrian civil war, following a formal request by the Syrian government for military help against rebel and jihadist groups.[188]
The Russian military activities consisted of air strikes, cruise missile strikes and the use of front line advisors and Russian special forces against militant groups opposed to the Syrian government, including the Syrian opposition, as well as Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), al-Nusra Front (al-Qaeda in the Levant), Tahrir al-Sham, Ahrar al-Sham, and the Army of Conquest.[189][190] After Putin's announcement on 14 March 2016 that the mission he had set for the Russian military in Syria had been "largely accomplished" and ordered the withdrawal of the "main part" of the Russian forces from Syria,[191] Russian forces deployed in Syria continued to actively operate in support of the Syrian government.[192]
Russia's interference in the 2016 US election
In January 2017, a U.S. intelligence community assessment expressed high confidence that Putin personally ordered an influence campaign, initially to denigrate Hillary Clinton and to harm her electoral chances and potential presidency, then later developing "a clear preference" for Donald Trump.[193] Trump consistently denied any Russian interference in the U.S. election,[194][195][196] as did Putin in December 2016,[197] March 2017,[198] June 2017,[199][200][201] and July 2017.[202]
Putin later stated that interference was "theoretically possible" and could have been perpetrated by "patriotically minded" Russian hackers,[203] and on another occasion claimed "not even Russians, but Ukrainians, Tatars or Jews, but with Russian citizenship" might have been responsible.[204] In July 2018, The New York Times reported that the CIA had long nurtured a Russian source who eventually rose to a position close to Putin, allowing the source to pass key information in 2016 about Putin's direct involvement.[205] Putin continued similar attempts in the 2020 U.S. presidential election.[206]
2018–present: Fourth presidential term
Putin and the newly appointed prime minister Mikhail Mishustin meeting with members of Mishustin's Cabinet, 21 January 2020 Putin won the 2018 Russian presidential election with more than 76% of the vote.[207] His fourth term began on 7 May 2018,[208] and will last until 2024.[209] On the same day, Putin invited Dmitry Medvedev to form a new government.[210] On 15 May 2018, Putin took part in the opening of the movement along the highway section of the Crimean bridge.[211] On 18 May 2018, Putin signed decrees on the composition of the new Government.[212] On 25 May 2018, Putin announced that he would not run for president in 2024, justifying this in compliance with the Russian Constitution.[213] On 14 June 2018, Putin opened the 21st FIFA World Cup, which took place in Russia for the first time. On 18 October 2018, Putin said Russians will 'go to Heaven as martyrs' in the event of a nuclear war as he would only use nuclear weapons in retaliation.[214] In September 2019, Putin's administration interfered with the results of Russia's nationwide regional elections and manipulated it by eliminating all candidates in the opposition. The event that was aimed at contributing to the ruling party, United Russia's victory, also contributed to inciting mass protests for democracy, leading to large-scale arrests and cases of police brutality.[215]
On 15 January 2020, Medvedev and his entire government resigned after Putin's 2020 Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly. Putin suggested major constitutional amendments that could extend his political power after presidency.[216][217] At the same time, on behalf of Putin, he continued to exercise his powers until the formation of a new government.[218] Putin suggested that Medvedev take the newly created post of deputy chairman of the Security Council.[219]
On the same day, Putin nominated Mikhail Mishustin, head of the country's Federal Tax Service for the post of prime minister. The next day, he was confirmed by the State Duma to the post,[220][221] and appointed prime minister by Putin's decree.[222] This was the first time ever that a prime minister was confirmed without any votes against. On 21 January 2020, Mishustin presented to Putin a draft structure of his Cabinet. On the same day, the president signed a decree on the structure of the Cabinet and appointed the proposed ministers.[223][224][225]
COVID-19 pandemic
Putin (dressed in the yellow hazmat suit) visits coronavirus patients at the City Clinical Hospital No. 40 in Moscow, 24 March 2020. On 15 March 2020, Putin instructed to form a Working Group of the State Council to counteract the spread of coronavirus. Putin appointed Moscow Mayor Sergey Sobyanin as the head of the group.[226]
On 22 March 2020, after a phone call with Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, Putin arranged the Russian army to send military medics, special disinfection vehicles and other medical equipment to Italy, which was the European country hardest hit by the COVID-19 pandemic.[227] Putin began working remotely from his office at Novo-Ogaryovo. According to Dmitry Peskov, Putin passes daily tests for coronavirus, and his health is not in danger.[228][229]
On 25 March, President Putin announced in a televised address to the nation that the 22 April constitutional referendum would be postponed due to the coronavirus.[230] He added that the next week would be a nationwide paid holiday and urged Russians to stay at home.[231][232] Putin also announced a list of measures of social protection, support for small and medium-sized enterprises, and changes in fiscal policy.[233] Putin announced the following measures for microenterprises, small- and medium-sized businesses: deferring tax payments (except Russia's value-added tax) for the next six months, cutting the size of social security contributions in half, deferring social security contributions, deferring loan repayments for the next six months, a six-month moratorium on fines, debt collection, and creditors' applications for bankruptcy of debtor enterprises.[234][235]
On 2 April 2020, Putin again issued an address in which he announced prolongation of the non-working time until 30 April.[236] Putin likened Russia's fight against COVID-19 to Russia's battles with invading Pecheneg and Cuman steppe nomads in the 10th and 11th centuries.[237] In a 24 to 27 April Levada poll, 48% of Russian respondents said that they disapproved of Putin's handling of the coronavirus pandemic,[238] and his strict isolation and lack of leadership during the crisis was widely commented as sign of losing his "strongman" image.[239][240]
Putin's first deputy chief of staff Sergey Kiriyenko (left) is in charge of Russia's domestic politics.[241] In June 2021, Putin said he was fully vaccinated against the disease with the Sputnik V vaccine, emphasising that while vaccinations should be voluntary, making them mandatory in some professions would slow down the spread of COVID-19.[242] In September, Putin entered self-isolation after people in his inner circle tested positive for the disease.[243]
According to a report by the Wall Street Journal, Putin's inner circle of advisors shrank during the COVID-19 lockdown to a small number of hawkish advisers.[244]
Constitutional referendum and amendments
Putin signed an executive order on 3 July 2020 to officially insert amendments into the Russian Constitution, allowing him to run for two additional six-year terms. These amendments took effect on 4 July 2020.[245]
Since 11 July, protests have been held in the Khabarovsk Krai in Russia's Far East in support of arrested regional governor Sergei Furgal.[246] The 2020 Khabarovsk Krai protests have become increasingly anti-Putin.[247][248] A July 2020 Levada poll found that 45% of surveyed Russians supported the protests.[249]
On 22 December 2020, Putin signed a bill giving lifetime prosecutorial immunity to Russian ex-presidents.[250][251]
Iran trade deal
Putin in a meeting with Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi and supreme leader Ali Khamenei on 19 July 2022 Putin met Iran President Ebrahim Raisi in January 2022 to lay the groundwork for a 20-year deal between the two nations.[252]
2021–2022 Russo-Ukrainian crisis
Putin holds a video call with U.S. president Joe Biden on 7 December 2021. In July 2021, Putin published an essay titled On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians, in which he states that Belarusians, Ukrainians and Russians should be in one All-Russian nation as a part of the Russian world and are "one people" whom "forces that have always sought to undermine our unity" wanted to "divide and rule".[253] The essay denies the existence of Ukraine as an independent nation.[254][255]
On 30 November 2021, Putin stated that an enlargement of NATO in Ukraine would be a "red line" issue for Russia.[256][257][258] The Kremlin repeatedly denied that it had any plans to invade Ukraine,[259][260][261] and Putin himself dismissed such fears as "alarmist".[262] On 21 February 2022, Putin signed a decree recognizing the two self proclaimed separatist republics in Donbas as independent states and made an address concerning the events in Ukraine.[263]
Putin was persuaded to invade Ukraine by a small group of his closest associates, especially Nikolai Patrushev, Yury Kovalchuk and Alexander Bortnikov.[264] According to sources close to the Kremlin, most of Putin's advisers and associates opposed the invasion, but Putin overruled them. The invasion of Ukraine had been planned for almost a year.[265]
Full-scale invasion of Ukraine (2022–present)
On 24 February, Putin in a televised address announced a "special military operation"[266] in Ukraine,[267][268] launching a full-scale invasion of the country.[269] Citing a purpose of "denazification", he claimed to be doing this to protect people in the predominantly Russian-speaking region of Donbas who, according to Putin, faced "humiliation and genocide" from Ukraine for eight years.[270] Minutes after the speech, he launched a war to gain control of the remainder of the country and overthrow the elected government under the pretext that it was run by Nazis.[271][272]
Protest against the Russian invasion of Ukraine in Nice, France, 27 February 2022 Russia's invasion was met with international condemnation.[273][274][275] International sanctions were widely imposed against Russia, including against Putin personally.[276][277] The invasion also led to numerous calls for Putin to be pursued with war crime charges.[278][279][280][281] The International Criminal Court (ICC) stated that it would investigate the possibility of war crimes in Ukraine since late 2013,[282] and the United States pledged to help the ICC to prosecute Putin and others for war crimes committed during the invasion of Ukraine.[283] In response to these condemnations, Putin put the Strategic Rocket Forces's nuclear deterrence units on high alert.[284] By early March, U.S. intelligence agencies determined that Putin was "frustrated" by slow progress due to an unexpectedly strong Ukrainian defense.[285]
Putin and Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu with Russian officers on 20 October 2022 On 4 March, Putin signed into law a bill introducing prison sentences of up to 15 years for those who publish "knowingly false information" about the Russian military and its operations, leading to some media outlets in Russia to stop reporting on Ukraine.[286] On 7 March, as a condition for ending the invasion, the Kremlin demanded Ukraine's neutrality, recognition of Crimea as Russian territory, and recognition of the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states.[287][288] On 16 March, Putin issued a warning to Russian "traitors" who he said the West wanted to use as a "fifth column" to destroy Russia.[289][290] Following the invasion of Ukraine in 2022,[291] Russia's long-term demographic crisis deepened due to emigration, lower fertility rates and war-related casualties.[292]
As early as 25 March, the UN Office of the High Commissioner on Human Rights reported that Putin ordered a "kidnapping" policy, whereby Ukrainian nationals who did not cooperate with the Russian takeover of their homeland were victimized by FSB agents.[293][294] On 28 March, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he was "99.9 percent sure" that Putin thought the Ukrainians would welcome the invading forces with "flowers and smiles" while he opened the door to negotiations on the offer that Ukraine would henceforth be a non-aligned state.[295]
On 21 September, Putin announced a partial mobilization, following a successful Ukrainian counteroffensive in Kharkiv and the announcement of annexation referendums in Russian-occupied Ukraine.[296]
Ukrainian oblasts annexed by Russia since 2014 (Crimea) and 2022 (Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia), with a red line marking the area of actual control by Russia on 30 September 2022 On 30 September, Putin signed decrees which annexed Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson Oblasts of Ukraine into the Russian Federation. The annexations are not recognized by the international community, and are illegal under international law.[297] On 11 November the same year, Ukraine liberated Kherson.[298]
In December 2022, he said that a war against Ukraine could be a "long process".[299] Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed in the Russo-Ukrainian War since February 2022.[300][301] In January 2023, Putin cited recognition of Russia's sovereignty over the annexed territories as a condition for peace talks with Ukraine.[302]
On 20–22 March 2023, Chinese President Xi Jinping visited Russia and met with Vladimir Putin both in official and unofficial capacity.[303] It was the first international meeting of Vladimir Putin since the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for his arrest.[304]
Putin welcomes Chinese President Xi Jinping to Moscow, 21 March 2023. In May 2023, South Africa announced that it would grant diplomatic immunity to Vladimir Putin to attend the 15th BRICS Summit in Johannesburg despite the ICC arrest warrant.[305] In July 2023, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa announced that Putin would not attend the summit "by mutual agreement" and would instead send Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.[306]
Putin with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa in St. Petersburg on 17 June 2023 In July 2023, Putin threatened to take "reciprocal action" if Ukraine used US-supplied cluster munitions during a Ukrainian counter-offensive against Russian forces in occupied southeastern Ukraine.[307] On 17 July 2023, Putin withdrew from a deal that allowed Ukraine to export grain across the Black Sea despite a wartime blockade,[308] risking deepening the global food crisis and antagonizing neutral countries in the Global South.[309]
On 27–28 July, Putin hosted the 2023 Russia–Africa Summit in St. Petersburg,[310] which was attended by delegations from more than 40 African countries.[311]
As of August 2023, the total number of Russian and Ukrainian soldiers killed or wounded during the Russian invasion of Ukraine was nearly 500,000.[312]
Putin condemned the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel that sparked the Israel–Hamas war and said Israel had a right to defend itself, but also criticized Israel's response and said Israel should not besiege the Gaza Strip in the way Nazi Germany besieged Leningrad. Putin suggested that Russia could be a mediator in the conflict.[313][314] Putin blamed the war on the United States' failed foreign policy in the Middle East and expressed concern over the suffering of Palestinian children in the Gaza Strip.[315] In a December 2023 call between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Putin, Netanyahu expressed displeasure over Russia's conduct at the United Nations and described its growing ties to Iran as dangerous.[316]
On 22 November 2023, Putin claimed that Russia was always "ready for talks" to end the "tragedy" of the war in Ukraine, and accused the Ukrainian leadership of rejecting peace talks with Russia.[317] However, on 14 December 2023, Putin said "there will only be peace in Ukraine when we achieve our aims", which he said are "de-Nazification, de-militarization and a neutral status" of Ukraine.[318] On 23 December 2023, The New York Times reported that Putin has been signaling through intermediaries since at least September 2022 that "he is open to a ceasefire that freezes the fighting along the current lines."[319]
ICC arrest warrant
Vladimir Putin in a meeting with Maria Lvova-Belova in the Kremlin during the Russian invasion of Ukraine On 17 March 2023, the International Criminal Court issued a warrant for Putin's arrest,[320][321][322][323] alleging that Putin held criminal responsibility in the illegal deportation and transfer of children from Ukraine to Russia during the Russian invasion of Ukraine.[324][325][326]
It was the first time that the ICC had issued an arrest warrant for the head of state of one of the five Permanent Members of the United Nations Security Council,[320] (the world's five principal nuclear powers).[327]
The ICC simultaneously issued an arrest warrant for Maria Lvova-Belova, Commissioner for Children's Rights in the Office of the President of the Russian Federation. Both are charged with:
- ...the war crime of unlawful deportation of population (children) and that of unlawful transfer of population (children) from occupied areas of Ukraine to the Russian Federation,...[322]
...for their publicized program, since 24 February 2022, of forced deportations of thousands of unaccompanied Ukrainian children to Russia, from areas of eastern Ukraine under Russian control.[320][322] Russia has maintained that the deportations were humanitarian efforts to protect orphans and other children abandoned in the conflict region.[320]
2023 Wagner rebellion
Putin making an address to the Russian people regarding Yevgeny Prigozhin's private military company Wagner Group rebellion on 24 June 2023 On 23 June 2023, the Wagner Group, a Russian paramilitary organization, rebelled against the government of Russia. The revolt arose amidst escalating tensions between the Russian Ministry of Defense and Yevgeny Prigozhin, the leader of Wagner.[328]
Prigozhin portrayed the rebellion as a response to an alleged attack on his forces by the ministry.[329][330] He dismissed the government's justification for invading Ukraine,[331] blamed Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu for the country's military shortcomings,[332] and accused him of waging the war for the benefit of Russian oligarchs.[333][334] In a televised address on 24 June, Russian president Vladimir Putin denounced Wagner's actions as treason and pledged to quell the rebellion.[330][335]
Prigozhin's forces seized control of Rostov-on-Don and the Southern Military District headquarters and advanced towards Moscow in an armored column.[336] Following negotiations with Belarusian president Alexander Lukashenko,[337] Prigozhin agreed to stand down[338] and, late on 24 June, began withdrawing from Rostov-on-Don.[339]
On 23 August 2023, exactly two months after the rebellion, Prigozhin was killed along with nine other people when a business jet crashed in Tver Oblast, north of Moscow.[340] Western intelligence reported that the crash was likely caused by an explosion on board, and it is widely suspected that the Russian state were involved.[341]
Domestic policies
Putin's domestic policies, particularly early in his first presidency, were aimed at creating a vertical power structure. On 13 May 2000, he issued a decree organizing the 89 federal subjects of Russia into seven administrative federal districts and appointed a presidential envoy responsible for each of those districts (whose official title is Plenipotentiary Representative).[342]
In May 2000, Putin introduced seven federal districts for administrative purposes. In January 2010, the 8th North Caucasus Federal District (shown here in purple) was split from the Southern Federal District. In March 2014, the new 9th Crimean Federal District was formed after the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation. In July 2016, it was incorporated into the Southern Federal District. According to Stephen White, under the presidency of Putin, Russia made it clear that it had no intention of establishing a "second edition" of the American or British political system, but rather a system that was closer to Russia's own traditions and circumstances.[343] Some commentators have described Putin's administration as a "sovereign democracy".[344][345][346] According to the proponents of that description (primarily Vladislav Surkov), the government's actions and policies ought above all to enjoy popular support within Russia itself and not be directed or influenced from outside the country.[347]
The practice of the system is characterized by Swedish economist Anders Åslund as manual management, commenting: "After Putin resumed the presidency in 2012, his rule is best described as 'manual management' as the Russians like to put it. Putin does whatever he wants, with little consideration to the consequences with one important caveat. During the Russian financial crash of August 1998, Putin learned that financial crises are politically destabilizing and must be avoided at all costs. Therefore, he cares about financial stability."[348]
The period after 2012 saw mass protests against the falsification of elections, censorship and toughening of free assembly laws. In July 2000, according to a law proposed by Putin and approved by the Federal Assembly of Russia, Putin gained the right to dismiss the heads of the 89 federal subjects. In 2004, the direct election of those heads (usually called "governors") by popular vote was replaced with a system whereby they would be nominated by the president and approved or disapproved by regional legislatures.[349][350]
This was seen by Putin as a necessary move to stop separatist tendencies and get rid of those governors who were connected with organised crime.[351] This and other government actions effected under Putin's presidency have been criticized by many independent Russian media outlets and Western commentators as anti-democratic.[352][353]
During his first term in office, Putin opposed some of the Yeltsin-era business oligarchs, as well as his political opponents, resulting in the exile or imprisonment of such people as Boris Berezovsky, Vladimir Gusinsky, and Mikhail Khodorkovsky; other oligarchs such as Roman Abramovich and Arkady Rotenberg are friends and allies with Putin.[354] Putin succeeded in codifying land law and tax law and promulgated new codes on labor, administrative, criminal, commercial and civil procedural law.[355] Under Medvedev's presidency, Putin's government implemented some key reforms in the area of state security, the Russian police reform and the Russian military reform.[356]
Economic, industrial, and energy policies
Russian GDP since the end of the Soviet Union (beyond 2014 are forecasts) Sergey Guriyev, when talking about Putin's economic policy, divided it into four distinct periods: the "reform" years of his first term (1999–2003); the "statist" years of his second term (2004 – the first half of 2008); the world economic crisis and recovery (the second half of 2008–2013); and the Russo-Ukrainian War, Russia's growing isolation from the global economy, and stagnation (2014–present).[357]
In 2000, Putin launched the "Programme for the Socio-Economic Development of the Russian Federation for the Period 2000–2010", but it was abandoned in 2008 when it was 30% complete.[358] Fueled by the 2000s commodities boom including record-high oil prices,[11][12] under the Putin administration from 2000 to 2016, an increase in income in USD terms was 4.5 times.[359] During Putin's first eight years in office, industry grew substantially, as did production, construction, real incomes, credit, and the middle class.[360][361] A fund for oil revenue allowed Russia to repay Soviet Union's debts by 2005. Russia joined the World Trade Organization in August 2012.[362]
In 2006, Putin launched an industry consolidation programme to bring the main aircraft-producing companies under a single umbrella organization, the United Aircraft Corporation (UAC).[363][364] In September 2020, the UAC general director announced that the UAC will receive the largest-ever post-Soviet government support package for the aircraft industry in order to pay and renegotiate the debt.[365][366]
Putin, Gazprom CEO Alexey Miller and Chinese President Xi Jinping. The Russian economy is heavily dependent on the export of natural resources such as oil and natural gas.[367] In 2014, Putin signed a deal to supply China with 38 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year. Power of Siberia, which Putin has called the "world's biggest construction project", was launched in 2019 and is expected to continue for 30 years at an ultimate cost to China of $400bn.[368] The ongoing financial crisis began in the second half of 2014 when the Russian ruble collapsed due to a decline in the price of oil and international sanctions against Russia. These events in turn led to loss of investor confidence and capital flight, though it has also been argued that the sanctions had little to no effect on Russia's economy.[369][370][371] In 2014, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project named Putin their Person of the Year for furthering corruption and organized crime.[372][373]
According to Meduza, Putin has since 2007 predicted on a number of occasions that Russia will become one of the world's five largest economies. In 2013, he said Russia was one of the five biggest economies in terms of gross domestic product but still lagged behind other countries on indicators such as labour productivity.[374]
Environmental policy
In 2004, Putin signed the Kyoto Protocol treaty designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.[375] However, Russia did not face mandatory cuts, because the Kyoto Protocol limits emissions to a percentage increase or decrease from 1990 levels and Russia's greenhouse-gas emissions fell well below the 1990 baseline due to a drop in economic output after the breakup of the Soviet Union.[376]
Religious policy
Putin with religious leaders of Russia, February 2001 Putin regularly attends the most important services of the Russian Orthodox Church on the main holy days and has established a good relationship with Patriarchs of the Russian Church, the late Alexy II of Moscow and the current Kirill of Moscow. As president, Putin took an active personal part in promoting the Act of Canonical Communion with the Moscow Patriarchate, signed 17 May 2007, which restored relations between the Moscow-based Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia after the 80-year schism.[377]
Under Putin, the Hasidic Federation of Jewish Communities of Russia became increasingly influential within the Jewish community, partly due to the influence of Federation-supporting businessmen mediated through their alliances with Putin, notably Lev Leviev and Roman Abramovich.[378][379] According to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Putin is popular amongst the Russian Jewish community, who see him as a force for stability. Russia's chief rabbi, Berel Lazar, said Putin "paid great attention to the needs of our community and related to us with a deep respect".[380] In 2016, Ronald S. Lauder, the president of the World Jewish Congress, also praised Putin for making Russia "a country where Jews are welcome".[381]
Human rights organizations and religious freedom advocates have criticized the state of religious freedom in Russia.[382] In 2016, Putin oversaw the passage of legislation that prohibited missionary activity in Russia.[382] Nonviolent religious minority groups have been repressed under anti-extremism laws, especially Jehovah's Witnesses.[383]
One of the 2020 amendments to the Constitution of Russia has a constitutional reference to God.[384]
Military development
Putin with Russia's long-serving Defense Minister Sergei Shoygu (left) and Chief of the General Staff Valery Gerasimov at the Vostok 2018 military exercise The resumption of long-distance flights of Russia's strategic bombers was followed by the announcement by Russian Defense Minister Anatoliy Serdyukov during his meeting with Putin on 5 December 2007, that 11 ships, including the aircraft carrier Kuznetsov, would take part in the first major navy sortie into the Mediterranean since Soviet times.[385][386]
While from the early 2000s Russia started placing more money into its military and defense industry, it was only in 2008 that full-scale Russian military reform began, aiming to modernize the Russian Armed Forces and make them significantly more effective. The reform was largely carried out by Defense Minister Serdyukov during Medvedev's presidency, under the supervision of both Putin, as the head of government, and Medvedev, as the commander-in-chief of the Russian Armed Forces.[citation needed]
Key elements of the reform included reducing the armed forces to a strength of one million, reducing the number of officers, centralising officer training from 65 military schools into 10 'systemic' military training centres, creating a professional NCO corps, reducing the size of the central command, introducing more civilian logistics and auxiliary staff, elimination of cadre-strength formations, reorganising the reserves, reorganising the army into a brigade system, and reorganising air forces into an airbase system instead of regiments.[citation needed]
Russian postage stamp honoring a soldier killed in the Russo-Ukrainian War. As of February 2023, the number of Russian soldiers killed and wounded in Ukraine was estimated at nearly 200,000.[387] According to the Kremlin, Putin embarked on a build-up of Russia's nuclear capabilities because of U.S. President George W. Bush's unilateral decision to withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.[388] To counter what Putin sees as the United States' goal of undermining Russia's strategic nuclear deterrent, Moscow has embarked on a program to develop new weapons capable of defeating any new American ballistic missile defense or interception system. Some analysts believe that this nuclear strategy under Putin has brought Russia into violation of the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty.[389]
Accordingly, U.S. President Donald Trump announced the U.S. would no longer consider itself bound by the treaty's provisions, raising nuclear tensions between the two powers.[389] This prompted Putin to state that Russia would not launch first in a nuclear conflict but that "an aggressor should know that vengeance is inevitable, that he will be annihilated, and we would be the victims of the aggression. We will go to heaven as martyrs".[390]
Putin has also sought to increase Russian territorial claims in the Arctic and its military presence there. In August 2007, Russian expedition Arktika 2007, part of research related to the 2001 Russian territorial extension claim, planted a flag on the seabed at the North Pole.[391] Both Russian submarines and troops deployed in the Arctic have been increasing.[392][393]
Human rights policy
Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny attends a march in memory of assassinated opposition politician Boris Nemtsov, Moscow, 29 February 2020. New York City-based NGO Human Rights Watch, in a report entitled Laws of Attrition, authored by Hugh Williamson, the British director of HRW's Europe & Central Asia Division, has claimed that since May 2012, when Putin was reelected as president, Russia has enacted many restrictive laws, started inspections of non-governmental organizations, harassed, intimidated and imprisoned political activists, and started to restrict critics. The new laws include the "foreign agents" law, which is widely regarded as over-broad by including Russian human rights organizations which receive some international grant funding, the treason law, and the assembly law which penalizes many expressions of dissent.[394][395] Human rights activists have criticized Russia for censoring speech of LGBT activists due to "the gay propaganda law"[396] and increasing violence against LGBT+ people due to the law.[397][398][399]
In 2020, Putin signed a law on labelling individuals and organizations receiving funding from abroad as "foreign agents". The law is an expansion of "foreign agent" legislation adopted in 2012.[400][401]
As of June 2020, per Memorial Human Rights Center, there were 380 political prisoners in Russia, including 63 individuals prosecuted, directly or indirectly, for political activities (including Alexey Navalny) and 245 prosecuted for their involvement with one of the Muslim organizations that are banned in Russia. 78 individuals on the list, i.e., more than 20% of the total, are residents of Crimea.[402][403] As of December 2022, more than 4,000 people were prosecuted for criticizing the war in Ukraine under Russia's war censorship laws.[404]
The media
Putin and Konstantin Ernst, chief of Russia's main state-controlled TV station Channel One. About 85% of Russians get most of their information from Russian state media.[405] Scott Gehlbach, a professor of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, has claimed that since 1999, Putin has systematically punished journalists who challenge his official point of view.[406] Maria Lipman, an American writing in Foreign Affairs claims, "The crackdown that followed Putin's return to the Kremlin in 2012 extended to the liberal media, which had until then been allowed to operate fairly independently."[407] The Internet has attracted Putin's attention because his critics have tried to use it to challenge his control of information.[408] Marian K. Leighton, who worked for the CIA as a Soviet analyst in the 1980s says, "Having muzzled Russia's print and broadcast media, Putin focused his energies on the Internet."[409]
Robert W. Orttung and Christopher Walker reported that "Reporters Without Borders, for instance, ranked Russia 148 in its 2013 list of 179 countries in terms of freedom of the press. It particularly criticized Russia for the crackdown on the political opposition and the failure of the authorities to vigorously pursue and bring to justice criminals who have murdered journalists. Freedom House ranks Russian media as "not free", indicating that basic safeguards and guarantees for journalists and media enterprises are absent."[410] About two-thirds of Russians use television as their primary source of daily news.[411]
In the early 2000s, Putin and his circle began promoting the idea in Russian media that they are the modern-day version of the 17th-century Romanov tsars who ended Russia's "Time of Troubles", meaning they claim to be the peacemakers and stabilizers after the fall of the Soviet Union.[412]
Promoting conservatism
This article is part of a series on Conservatism in Russia 
Putin attends the Orthodox Christmas service in the village Turginovo in Kalininsky District, Tver Oblast, 7 January 2016. Putin has promoted explicitly conservative policies in social, cultural, and political matters, both at home and abroad. Putin has attacked globalism and neoliberalism and is identified by scholars with Russian conservatism.[413] Putin has promoted new think tanks that bring together like-minded intellectuals and writers. For example, the Izborsky Club, founded in 2012 by the conservative right-wing journalist Alexander Prokhanov, stresses (i) Russian nationalism, (ii) the restoration of Russia's historical greatness, and (iii) systematic opposition to liberal ideas and policies.[414] Vladislav Surkov, a senior government official, has been one of the key economics consultants during Putin's presidency.[415]
In cultural and social affairs Putin has collaborated closely with the Russian Orthodox Church. Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, head of the Church, endorsed his election in 2012 stating Putin's terms were like "a miracle of God."[416] Steven Myers reports, "The church, once heavily repressed, had emerged from the Soviet collapse as one of the most respected institutions... Now Kiril led the faithful directly into an alliance with the state."[417]
Mark Woods, a Baptist Union of Great Britain minister and contributing editor to Christian Today, provides specific examples of how the Church has backed the expansion of Russian power into Crimea and eastern Ukraine.[418] Some Russian Orthodox believers consider Putin a corrupt and brutal strongman or even a tyrant. Others do not admire him but appreciate that he aggravates their political opponents. Still others appreciate that Putin defends some although not all Orthodox teachings, whether or not he believes in them himself.[419]
On abortion, Putin stated: "In the modern world, the decision is up to the woman herself."[420] This put him at odds with the Russian Orthodox Church.[421] In 2020, he supported efforts to reduce the number of abortions instead of prohibiting it.[422] On 28 November 2023, during a speech to the World Russian People's Council, Putin urged Russian women to have "seven, eight, or even more children" and said "large families must become the norm, a way of life for all of Russia's people".[423]
Putin supported the 2020 Russian constitutional referendum, which passed and defined marriage as a relationship between one man and one woman in the Constitution of Russia.[424][425][426]
International sporting events
Putin, FIFA President Gianni Infantino and French President Emmanuel Macron at the 2018 FIFA World Cup Final in Russia as French forward Kylian Mbappé receives the best young player award In 2007, Putin led a successful effort on behalf of Sochi for the 2014 Winter Olympics and the 2014 Winter Paralympics,[427] the first Winter Olympic Games to ever be hosted by Russia. In 2008, the city of Kazan won the bid for the 2013 Summer Universiade; on 2 December 2010, Russia won the right to host the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup and 2018 FIFA World Cup, also for the first time in Russian history. In 2013, Putin stated that gay athletes would not face any discrimination at the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.[428]
Foreign policy
Putin's visit to the United States, November 2001 Generally, Putin's tenure experiences tensions with the west.[429][430] Anna Borshchevskaya, in her 2022 book, summarizes Putin main foreign policy objectives as originating in his 30 December 1999 document which appeared on the government's website, "Russia at the Turn of the Millenium".[431] She presents Putin as orienting himself to the plan that "Russia is a country with unique values in danger of losing its unity—which... is a historic Russian fear. This again points to the fundamental issue of Russia's identity issues—and how the state had manipulated these to drive anti-Western security narratives with the aim of eroding the US-led global order... Moreover, a look at Russia's distribution of forces over the years under Putin has been heavily weighted towards the south (Syria, Ukraine, Middle East), another indicator of the Kremlin's threat perceptions."[432][433]
Leonid Bershidsky analyzed Putin's interview with the Financial Times and concluded, "Putin is an imperialist of the old Soviet school, rather than a nationalist or a racist, and he has cooperated with, and promoted, people who are known to be gay."[434] Putin spoke favorably of artificial intelligence in regards to foreign policy, "Artificial intelligence is the future, not only for Russia, but for all humankind. It comes with colossal opportunities, but also threats that are difficult to predict. Whoever becomes the leader in this sphere will become the ruler of the world."[435]
Asia
Putin with Indian prime minister Modi in New Delhi In 2012, Putin wrote an article in Indian newspaper The Hindu, saying: "The Declaration on Strategic Partnership between India and Russia signed in October 2000 became a truly historic step."[436][437] India remains the largest customer of Russian military equipment, and the two countries share a historically strong strategic and diplomatic relationship.[438] In October 2022, Putin described India and China as "close allies and partners".[439]
Under Putin, Russia has maintained positive relations with the Asian states of SCO and BRICS, which include China, India, Pakistan, and post-Soviet states of Central Asia.[440][441] In the 21st century, Sino-Russian relations have significantly strengthened bilaterally and economically—the Treaty of Friendship, and the construction of the ESPO oil pipeline and the Power of Siberia gas pipeline formed a "special relationship" between the two great powers.[442]
Putin and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe frequently met each other to discuss the Japan–Russia territorial disputes. Putin also voiced his willingness of constructing a rail bridge between the two countries.[443] Despite numerous meetings, no agreement was signed before Abe's resignation in 2020.[444][445]
Putin with Chinese President Xi Jinping and other leaders at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Uzbekistan on 16 September 2022 Putin made three visits to Mongolia and has enjoyed good relations with its neighbor. Putin and his Mongolian counterpart signed a permanent treaty on friendship between the two states in September 2019, further enhancing trade and cultural exchanges.[446][447] Putin became the first Russian or Soviet leader to visit Indonesia in half a century in 2007, resulting in the signing of an arms deal.[448] In another visit, Putin commented on long-standing ties and friendship between Russia and Indonesia.[449] Russia has also boosted relations with Vietnam after 2011,[450] and with Afghanistan in the 2010s, giving military and economic aid.[451][452] The relations between Russia and the Philippines received a boost in 2016 as Putin forged closer bilateral ties with his Filipino counterpart, Rodrigo Duterte.[453][454] Putin has good relations with Malaysia and its then Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad.[455] Putin also made the first Russian or Soviet leader to visit North Korea, meeting Kim Jong-il in July 2000, shortly after a visit to South Korea.[456]
Putin criticized violence in Myanmar against Rohingya minorities in 2017.[457] Following the 2021 Myanmar coup d'état, Russia has pledged to boost ties with the Myanmar military regime.[458]
Post-Soviet states
Post-Soviet states in English alphabetical order: - Armenia
- Azerbaijan
- Belarus
- Estonia
- Georgia
- Kazakhstan
- Kyrgyzstan
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- Moldova
- Russia
- Tajikistan
- Turkmenistan
- Ukraine
- Uzbekistan
Under Putin, the Kremlin has consistently stated that Russia has a sphere of influence and "privileged interests" over other Post-Soviet states, which are referred to as the "near abroad" in Russia. It has also been stated that the post-Soviet states are strategically vital to Russian interests.[459] Some Russia experts have compared this concept to the Monroe Doctrine.[460]
A series of so-called colour revolutions in the post-Soviet states, namely the Rose Revolution in Georgia in 2003, the Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2004 and the Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan in 2005, led to frictions in the relations of those countries with Russia. In December 2004, Putin criticized the Rose and Orange revolutions, saying: "If you have permanent revolutions you risk plunging the post-Soviet space into endless conflict".[461]
Putin allegedly declared at a NATO-Russia summit in 2008 that if Ukraine joined NATO Russia could contend to annex the Ukrainian East and Crimea.[462] At the summit, he told U.S. President George W. Bush that "Ukraine is not even a state!" while the following year Putin referred to Ukraine as "Little Russia".[463] Following the Revolution of Dignity in March 2014, the Russian Federation annexed Crimea.[464][465][466] According to Putin, this was done because "Crimea has always been and remains an inseparable part of Russia".[467]
After the Russian annexation of Crimea, he said that Ukraine includes "regions of Russia's historic south" and "was created on a whim by the Bolsheviks".[468] He went on to declare that the February 2014 ousting of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych had been orchestrated by the West as an attempt to weaken Russia. "Our Western partners have crossed a line. They behaved rudely, irresponsibly and unprofessionally," he said, adding that the people who had come to power in Ukraine were "nationalists, neo-Nazis, Russophobes and anti-Semites".[468]
Putin hosted a meeting of the Russian-led military alliance, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), in Moscow on 16 May 2022. In a July 2014 speech during a Russian-supported armed insurgency in Eastern Ukraine, Putin stated he would use Russia's "entire arsenal of available means" up to "operations under international humanitarian law and the right of self-defence" to protect Russian speakers outside Russia.[469][470] With the attainment of autocephaly by the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in December 2018 and subsequent schism of the Russian Orthodox Church from Constantinople, a number of experts came to the conclusion that Putin's policy of forceful engagement in post-Soviet republics significantly backfired on him, leading to a situation where he "annexed Crimea, but lost Ukraine", and provoked a much more cautious approach to Russia among other post-Soviet countries.[471][472]
In late August 2014, Putin stated: "People who have their own views on history and the history of our country may argue with me, but it seems to me that the Russian and Ukrainian peoples are practically one people".[473] After making a similar statement, in late December 2015 he stated: "the Ukrainian culture, as well as Ukrainian literature, surely has a source of its own".[474] In July 2021, he published a lengthy article On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians[475] revisiting these themes, and saying the formation of a Ukrainian state hostile to Moscow was "comparable in its consequences to the use of weapons of mass destruction against us",[476][477]—it was made mandatory reading for military-political training in the Russian Armed Forces.[478]
Ukrainian president Zelenskyy, German chancellor Merkel, French president Macron and Putin met in Paris on 9 December 2019 in the "Normandy Format" aimed at ending the war in Donbas. In August 2008, Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili attempted to restore control over the breakaway South Ossetia. However, the Georgian military was soon defeated in the resulting 2008 South Ossetia War after regular Russian forces entered South Ossetia and then other parts of Georgia, then also opened a second front in the other Georgian breakaway province of Abkhazia with Abkhazian forces.[479][480]
Despite existing or past tensions between Russia and most of the post-Soviet states, Putin has followed the policy of Eurasian integration. Putin endorsed the idea of a Eurasian Union in 2011;[481][482] the concept was proposed by the president of Kazakhstan in 1994.[483] On 18 November 2011, the presidents of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia signed an agreement setting a target of establishing the Eurasian Union by 2015.[484] The Eurasian Union was established on 1 January 2015.[485]
Under Putin, Russia's relations have improved significantly with Uzbekistan, the second largest post-Soviet republic after Ukraine. This was demonstrated in Putin's visit to Tashkent in May 2000, after lukewarm relations under Yeltsin and Islam Karimov who had long distanced itself from Moscow.[486] In another meeting in 2014, Russia agreed to write off Uzbek debt.[487]
A theme of a greater Soviet region, including the former USSR and many of its neighbors or imperial-era states—rather than just post-Soviet Russia—has been consistent in Putin's May Day speeches.[488][489][490]
On 22 December 2022, Putin addressed the Security Council in a speech where he did not use the term "Special Military Operation" but instead called the fighting in Ukraine a "war". Anti-Putin activists have called for Putin to be prosecuted for breaking a law passed to stop people calling the Special Military Operation a war. This law carries a penalty of up to 15 years in jail.[491]
On 25 December, he openly declared in a TV interview that the goal of the invasion is "to unite the Russian people."[492]
On 14 December 2023, President Putin held a press conference where he indicated that Russian would only negotiate with Ukraine "when we achieve our objectives". He stated that another mobilization wasn't required as "617,000" Russian soldiers were fighting in Ukraine.[493]
United States, Western Europe, and NATO
Putin with Pope John Paul II and Holy See's Secretary of State Angelo Sodano on 5 June 2000 
Putin with Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi and U.S. president George W. Bush at the NATO-Russia Council meeting in Rome on 28 May 2002[494] Under Putin, Russia's relationships with NATO and the U.S. have passed through several stages. When he first became president, relations were cautious, but after the 9/11 attacks Putin quickly supported the U.S. in the War on Terror and the opportunity for partnership appeared.[495] According to Stephen F. Cohen, the U.S. "repaid by further expansion of NATO to Russia's borders and by unilateral withdrawal from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty",[495] but others pointed out the applications from new countries willing to join NATO was driven primarily by Russian's behavior in Chechnya, Transnistria, Abkhazia, Yanayev putsch as well as calls to restore USSR in its previous borders by prominent Russian politicians.[496][497]
From 2003, when Russia strongly opposed the U.S. when it waged the Iraq War, Putin became ever more distant from the West, and relations steadily deteriorated. According to Russia scholar Stephen F. Cohen, the narrative of the mainstream U.S. media, following that of the White House, became anti-Putin.[495] In an interview with Michael Stürmer, Putin said there were three questions which most concerned Russia and Eastern Europe: namely, the status of Kosovo, the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe and American plans to build missile defence sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, and suggested that all three were linked.[498] His view was that concessions by the West on one of the questions might be met with concessions from Russia on another.[498]
— Putin criticizing the United States in his Munich Speech, 2007[499]
In a January 2007 interview, Putin said Russia was in favor of a democratic multipolar world and strengthening the systems of international law.[500] In February 2007, Putin criticized what he called the United States' monopolistic dominance in global relations, and "almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations". He said the result of it is that "no one feels safe! Because no one can feel that international law is like a stone wall that will protect them. Of course such a policy stimulates an arms race".[501] This came to be known as the Munich Speech, and NATO secretary Jaap de Hoop Scheffer called the speech "disappointing and not helpful."[502]
Putin with U.S. president Donald Trump at the summit meeting in Helsinki, Finland, 16 July 2018 The months following Putin's Munich Speech[501] were marked by tension and a surge in rhetoric on both sides of the Atlantic. Both Russian and American officials, however, denied the idea of a new Cold War.[503] Putin publicly opposed plans for the U.S. missile shield in Europe and presented President George W. Bush with a counterproposal on 7 June 2007 which was declined.[504] Russia suspended its participation in the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty on 11 December 2007.[505]
Putin opposed Kosovo's unilateral declaration of independence from Serbia on 17 February 2008, warning that it would destabilize the whole system of international relations.[506][better source needed] He described the recognition of Kosovo's independence by several major world powers as "a terrible precedent, which will de facto blow apart the whole system of international relations, developed not over decades, but over centuries", and that "they have not thought through the results of what they are doing. At the end of the day it is a two-ended stick and the second end will come back and hit them in the face".[507] In March 2014, Putin used Kosovo's declaration of independence as a justification for recognizing the independence of Crimea, citing the so-called "Kosovo independence precedent".[508][509]
After the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. in 2001, Putin had good relations with American President George W. Bush, and many western European leaders. His "cooler" and "more business-like" relationship with German chancellor, Angela Merkel is often attributed to Merkel's upbringing in the former DDR, where Putin was stationed as a KGB agent.[510] He had a very friendly and warm relationship with the former Prime Minister of Italy Silvio Berlusconi;[511] the two leaders often described their relationship as a close friendship, continuing to organize bilateral meetings even after Berlusconi's resignation in November 2011.[512] When Berlusconi died in 2023, Putin described him as an "extraordinary man" and a "true friend".[513][514]
Putin held a meeting in Sochi with German chancellor Angela Merkel to discuss Nord Stream 2 natural gas pipeline in May 2018. The NATO-led military intervention in Libya in 2011 prompted a widespread wave of criticism from several world leaders, including Putin, who said that the United Nations Security Council Resolution 1973 is "defective and flawed", adding: "It allows everything. It resembles medieval calls for crusades."[515]
In late 2013, Russian-American relations deteriorated further when the United States canceled a summit for the first time since 1960 after Putin gave asylum to American Edward Snowden, who had leaked massive amounts of classified information from the NSA.[516][517] In 2014, Russia was suspended from the G8 group as a result of its annexation of Crimea.[518][519] Putin gave a speech highly critical of the United States, accusing them of destabilizing world order and trying to "reshape the world" to its own benefit.[520] In June 2015, Putin said that Russia has no intention of attacking NATO.[521]
According to Putin, he and Russia have a particularly good relationship to neighboring country Finland.[522] Picture of Putin handshaking with Sauli Niinistö, the president of Finland, in August 2019. On 9 November 2016, Putin congratulated Donald Trump on becoming the 45th president of the United States.[523] In December 2016, US intelligence officials (headed by James Clapper) quoted by CBS News stated that Putin approved the email hacking and cyber attacks during the U.S. election, against the Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. A spokesman for Putin denied the reports.[524] Putin has repeatedly accused Hillary Clinton, who served as U.S. secretary of state from 2009 to 2013 of interfering in Russia's internal affairs,[525] and in December 2016, Clinton accused Putin of having a personal grudge against her.[526][527]
With the election of Trump, Putin's favorability in the U.S. increased. A Gallup poll in February 2017 revealed a positive view of Putin among 22% of Americans, the highest since 2003.[528] Putin has stated that U.S.–Russian relations, already at the lowest level since the end of the Cold War,[529] have continued to deteriorate after Trump took office in January 2017.[530]
On 18 June 2020, The National Interest published a nine-thousand-word essay by Putin, titled "The Real Lessons of the 75th Anniversary of World War II".[531] In the essay, Putin criticizes the Western historical view of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact as the start of World War II, stating that the Munich Agreement was the beginning.[532]
On 21 February 2023, Putin suspended Russia's participation in the New START nuclear arms reduction treaty with the United States.[533]
On 25 March, President Putin announced the stationing of tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus. Russia would maintain control of the weapons. President Putin told Russian TV: "There is nothing unusual here either. Firstly, the United States has been doing this for decades. They have long deployed their tactical nuclear weapons on the territory of their allied countries."[534]
United Kingdom
Putin and his wife Lyudmila meeting with Queen Elizabeth II, her husband Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, and Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2005 In 2003, relations between Russia and the United Kingdom deteriorated when the United Kingdom granted political asylum to Putin's former patron, oligarch Boris Berezovsky.[535] This deterioration was intensified by allegations that the British were spying and making secret payments to pro-democracy and human rights groups.[536] A survey conducted in the United Kingdom in 2022 found Putin to be among the least popular foreign leaders, with 8% of British respondents holding a positive opinion.[537]
Poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko
The end of 2006 brought more strained relations in the wake of the death by polonium poisoning in London of former KGB and FSB officer Alexander Litvinenko, who became an MI6 agent in 2003. In 2007, the crisis in relations continued with the expulsion of four Russian envoys over Russia's refusal to extradite former KGB bodyguard Andrei Lugovoi to face charges in the murder.[535] Mirroring the British actions, Russia expelled UK diplomats and took other retaliatory steps.[535]
In 2015, the British Government launched a public inquiry into Litvinenko's death, presided over by Robert Owen, a former British High Court judge.[538] The Owen report, published on 21 January 2016, stated "The FSB operation to kill Mr. Litvinenko was probably approved by Mr Patrushev and also by President Putin."[539] The report outlined some possible motives for the murder, including Litvinenko's public statements and books about the alleged involvement of the FSB in mass murder, and what was "undoubtedly a personal dimension to the antagonism" between Putin and Litvinenko.[540]
Poisoning of Sergei Skripal
On 4 March 2018, former double agent Sergei Skripal was poisoned with a Novichok nerve agent in Salisbury.[541] Ten days later, the British government formally accused the Russian state of attempted murder, a charge which Russia denied.[542] After the UK expelled 23 Russian diplomats (an action which would later be responded to with a Russian expulsion of 23 British diplomats),[543] British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson said on 16 March that it was "overwhelmingly likely" Putin had personally ordered the poisoning of Skripal. Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the allegation "shocking and unpardonable diplomatic misconduct".[544]
Latin America
Putin and Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on 10 October 2019 Putin and his successor, Medvedev, enjoyed warm relations with Hugo Chávez of Venezuela. Much of this has been through the sale of military equipment; since 2005, Venezuela has purchased more than $4 billion worth of arms from Russia.[545] In September 2008, Russia sent Tupolev Tu-160 bombers to Venezuela to carry out training flights.[546] In November 2008, both countries held a joint naval exercise in the Caribbean. Earlier in 2000, Putin had re-established stronger ties with Fidel Castro's Cuba.[547]
"You express the best masculine qualities," Putin told Jair Bolsonaro in 2020. "You look for solutions in all matters, always putting above all the interests of your people, your country, leaving out your own personal issues." Political scientist Oliver Stuenkel noted, "Among Brazil's right-wing populists, Putin is seen as someone who is anti-woke, and that is seen as something that is definitely appealing to Bolsonaro. He is a strongman, and that is very inspiring to Bolsonaro. He would like to be someone who concentrates as much power."[548]
Australia and the South Pacific
In September 2007, Putin visited Indonesia and in doing so became the first Russian leader to visit the country in more than 50 years.[549] In the same month, Putin also attended the APEC meeting held in Sydney, Australia, where he met with Prime Minister John Howard and signed a uranium trade deal for Australia to sell uranium to Russia. This was the first visit by a Russian president to Australia.[550] Putin again visited Australia for 2014 G20 Brisbane summit. The Abbott government denounced Putin's use of military force in Ukraine in 2014 as "bullying" and "utterly unacceptable".[551]
Amid calls to ban Putin from attending the 2014 G20 Summit, Prime Minister Tony Abbott said he would "shirtfront" (challenge) the Russian leader over the shooting down of MH17 by Russian-backed rebels, which had killed 38 Australians.[552] Putin denied responsibility for the killings.[553]
Following Putin's invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the invasion was "unprovoked, unjust and illegal" and labeled Putin a "thug".[554] New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern denounced Putin as a "bully".[555] Fijian Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama tweeted "Fiji and our fellow Pacific Island Countries have united as nations of peace-loving people to condemn the conflict in Ukraine", while the Solomon Islands UN ambassador called the invasion a "violation of the rule of law".[556]
Middle East and Africa
Putin with Iranian president Hassan Rouhani and Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, September 2018 On 16 October 2007, Putin visited Iran to participate in the Second Caspian Summit in Tehran,[557][558] where he met with Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.[559][560] This was the first visit of a Soviet or Russian leader[561] to Iran since Joseph Stalin's participation in the Tehran Conference in 1943, and marked a significant event in Iran–Russia relations.[562] At a press conference after the summit Putin said that "all our (Caspian) states have the right to develop their peaceful nuclear programmes without any restrictions".[563]
Putin was quoted as describing Iran as a "partner",[498] though he expressed concerns over the Iranian nuclear programme.[498]
In April 2008, Putin became the first Russian president to visit Libya.[564] Putin condemned the 2011 foreign military intervention in Libya, referring to the UN resolution as "defective and flawed," and added "It allows everything. It resembles medieval calls for crusades."[565] Upon the death of Muammar Gaddafi, Putin called it as "planned murder" by the US, saying: "They showed to the whole world how he (Gaddafi) was killed," and "There was blood all over. Is that what they call a democracy?"[566][567]
Putin with African leaders at the Russia–Africa Summit in Sochi, Russia on 24 October 2019 From 2000 to 2010, Russia sold around $1.5 billion worth of arms to Syria, making Damascus Russia's seventh-largest client.[568] During the Syrian civil war, Russia threatened to veto any sanctions against the Syrian government,[569] and continued to supply arms to its regime.
Putin opposed any foreign intervention in the Syrian civil war. In June 2012, in Paris, he rejected the statement of French president François Hollande who called on Bashar al-Assad to step down. Putin echoed Assad's argument that anti-regime militants were responsible for much of the bloodshed. He also talked about previous NATO interventions and their results, and asked "What is happening in Libya, in Iraq? Did they become safer? Where are they heading? Nobody has an answer".[570]
Putin met with the President of the African Union, Macky Sall, to discuss grain deliveries from Russia and Ukraine to Africa on 3 June 2022. The war in Ukraine contributed to the 2022–2023 food crises.[571] On 11 September 2013, The New York Times published an op-ed by Putin urging caution against US intervention in Syria and criticizing American exceptionalism.[572] Putin subsequently helped to arrange for the destruction of Syria's chemical weapons.[573] In 2015, he took a stronger pro-Assad stance[574] and mobilized military support for the regime. Some analysts have summarized Putin as being allied with Shiites and Alawites in the Middle East.[575][576]
In 2017, Putin dispatched Russian PMCs to back the Touadéra regime in the Central African Republic Civil War, gaining a permanent military presence in return.[577][578][579][580] The first Russia-Africa Summit was held in October 2019 in Sochi, Russia, co-hosted by Putin and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi.[581] The meeting was attended by 43 heads of state and government from African countries.[582]
In October 2019, Putin visited the United Arab Emirates, where six agreements were struck with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed. One of them included shared investments between Russian sovereign wealth fund and the Emirati investment fund Mubadala. The two nations signed deals worth over $1.3bn, in energy, health and advance technology sectors.[583]
On 22 October 2021, Putin highlighted the "unique bond" between Russia and Israel during a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett.[584]
Public image
Putin opens the Wall of Grief, a monument to victims of Stalinist repression, October 2017. Polls and rankings
The director of the Levada Center stated in 2015 that drawing conclusions from Russian poll results or comparing them to polls in democratic states was irrelevant, as there is no real political competition in Russia, where, unlike in democratic states, Russian voters are not offered any credible alternatives and public opinion is primarily formed by state-controlled media, which promotes those in power and discredits alternative candidates.[585]
Putin with local people in the Siberian republic of Tuva in 2007 In a June 2007 public opinion survey, Putin's approval rating was 81%, the second-highest of any leader in the world that year.[586] In January 2013, at the time of the 2011–2013 Russian protests, Putin's rating fell to 62%, the lowest since 2000.[587] After EU and U.S. sanctions against Russian officials as a result of the crisis in Ukraine, Putin's approval rating reached 87% in August 2014.[588] In February 2015, based on domestic polling, Putin was ranked the world's most popular politician.[589] In June 2015, Putin's approval rating climbed to 89%, an all-time high.[590][591][592] Observers saw Putin's high approval ratings in 2010s as a consequence of improvements in living standards, and Russia's reassertion on the world scene during his presidency.[593][594] Putin was also highly popular in some non-Western countries, such as Vietnam, where his approval rating was 89% in 2017.[595]
Despite high approval for Putin, public confidence in the Russian economy was low, dropping to levels in 2016 that rivaled the lows in 2009 at the height of the global economic crisis.[596] Putin's performance in reining in corruption is unpopular among Russians. Newsweek reported in 2017 that a poll "indicated that 67% held Putin personally responsible for high-level corruption".[597] Corruption is a significant problem in Russia.[598][599]
Vladimir Putin's public approval 1999–2020 (Levada, 2020)[600] In October 2018, two-thirds of Russians surveyed agreed that "Putin bears full responsibility for the problems of the country" which has been attributed[601] to a decline in a popular belief in "good tsar and bad boyars", a traditional attitude towards justifying failures at the top of the ruling hierarchy in Russia.[602] In January 2019, the percentage of Russians trusting Putin hit a then-historic low – 33%.[603] In April 2019 Gallup poll showed a record number of Russians, 20%, willing to permanently emigrate from Russia.[604] The decline was even larger in the 17–25 age group, "who find themselves largely disconnected from the country's aging leadership, nostalgic Soviet rhetoric and nepotistic agenda". Putin's approval rating among young Russians was 32% in January 2019. The percentage willing to emigrate permanently in this group was 41%. 60% had favorable views of the US (three times more than in the 55+ age group).[605] Decline in support for the president and government is visible in other polls, such as a rapidly growing readiness to protest against poor living conditions.
In May 2020, amid the COVID crisis, Putin's approval rating was 68%, when respondents were presented a list of names (closed question),[606] and 27% when respondents were expected to name politicians they trust (open question).[607] This has been attributed to continued post-Crimea economic stagnation but also an apathetic response to the pandemic crisis in Russia.[608] Polls conducted in November 2021 after the failure of a Russian COVID-19 vaccination campaign indicated distrust of Putin was a major contributing factor for vaccine hesitancy, with regional polls indicating numbers as low as 20–30% in the Volga Federal District.[609]
In May 2021, 33% indicated Putin in response to "who would you vote for this weekend?" among Moscow respondents and 40% outside Moscow.[610] A survey released in October 2021 found 53% of respondents saying they trusted Putin.[611]
Observers see a generational struggle among Russians over perception of Putin's rule, with younger Russians more likely to be against Putin and older Russians more likely to accept the narrative presented by state-controlled media in Russia.[612] Putin's support among Russians aged 18–24 was only 20% in December 2020.[613]
The Levada Center survey showed that 58% of surveyed Russians supported the 2017 Russian protests against high-level corruption.[614] Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, state-controlled TV, where most Russians get their news, presented the invasion as a "special military operation" and liberation mission, in line with the government's narrative.[615][616][617] The Russian censorship apparatus Roskomnadzor ordered the country's media to employ information only from state sources or face fines and blocks.[618] The Russian media was banned from using the words "war", "invasion" or "aggression" to describe the invasion,[616] with media outlets being blocked as a result.[619]
In late February 2022, a survey conducted by the independent research group Russian Field found that 59% of respondents supported the "special military operation" in Ukraine.[620] According to the poll, in the group of 18-to-24-year-olds, only 29% supported the "special military operation".[621] In late February and mid-March 2022 two polls surveyed Russians' sentiments about the "special military operation" in Ukraine. The results were obtained by Radio Liberty.[622] 71% of Russians polled said that they supported the "special military operation" in Ukraine.[623][622]
Putin speaking at the "Russia-Africa" parliamentary conference in Moscow on 20 March 2023. According to the Economist Intelligence Unit, two-thirds of the world's population live in countries that are neutral or leaning towards Russia.[405] When asked how they were affected by the actions of Putin, a third said they strongly believed Putin was working in their interests. Another 26% said he was working in their interests to some extent. In general, most Russians believe that it would be better if Putin remained president for as long as possible.[623][622] Similarly, a survey conducted in early March found 58% of Russian respondents approved of the operation.[624][625]
In March 2022, 97% of Ukrainians said they had an unfavorable view of Putin, and 98% of Ukrainians – including 82% of ethnic Russians living in Ukraine – said they did not believe any part of Ukraine was rightfully part of Russia.[626] A poll published on 30 March in Russia saw Putin's approval rating jump, from 71% in February, to 83%.[627][628] However, experts warned that the figures may not accurately reflect the public mood, as the public tends to rally around leaders during war and some may be hiding their true opinions,[629] especially with the Russian 2022 war censorship laws prohibiting dissemination of "fake information" about the military.[630] Many respondents do not want to answer pollsters' questions for fear of negative consequences.[620] When researchers commissioned a survey on Russians' attitudes to the war, 29,400 out of 31,000 refused to answer.[631] The Levada Center's director, stated that early feelings of "shock and confusion" was being replaced with the belief that Russia was being besieged and that Russians must rally around their leader.[619] The Kremlin's analysis concluded that public support for the war was broad but not deep, and that most Russians would accept anything Putin labeled a victory. In September 2023, the head of the VTsIOM state pollster Valery Fyodorov said in an interview that only 10-15% of Russians actively supported the war, and that "most Russians are not demanding the conquest of Kyiv or Odesa."[319]
Cult of personality
Putin driving a Formula One car, 2010 (video) Putin has cultivated a cult of personality for himself with an outdoorsy, sporty, tough guy public image, demonstrating his physical prowess and taking part in unusual or dangerous acts, such as extreme sports and interaction with wild animals,[632] part of a public relations approach that, according to Wired, "deliberately cultivates the macho, take-charge superhero image".[633] In 2007, the tabloid Komsomolskaya Pravda published a huge photograph of a shirtless Putin vacationing in the Siberian mountains under the headline "Be Like Putin".[634]
Numerous Kremlinologists have accused Putin of seeking to create a cult of personality around himself, an accusation that the Kremlin has denied.[635] Some of Putin's activities have been criticised for being staged;[636][637] outside of Russia, his macho image has been the subject of parody.[638][639][640] Putin's height has been estimated by Kremlin insiders to be between 155 and 165 centimetres (5 feet 1 inch and 5 feet 5 inches) tall but is usually given at 170 centimetres (5 feet 7 inches).[641][642]
There are many songs about Putin,[643] and Putin's name and image are widely used in advertisement and product branding.[633] Among the Putin-branded products are Putinka vodka, the PuTin brand of canned food, the Gorbusha Putina caviar, and a collection of T-shirts with his image.[644]
Public recognition in the West
In 2007, he was the Time Person of the Year.[645][646] In 2015, he was No. 1 on the Time's Most Influential People List.[647][648] Forbes ranked him the World's Most Powerful Individual every year from 2013 to 2016.[649] He was ranked the second most powerful individual by Forbes in 2018.[650]
In Germany, the word "Putinversteher" (female form "Putinversteherin") is a neologism and a political buzzword (Putin + verstehen), which literally translates "Putin understander", i.e., "one who understands Putin".[651] It is a pejorative reference to politicians and pundits who express empathy to Putin and may also be translated as "Putin-empathizer".[652]
Putinisms
Putin has produced many aphorisms and catch-phrases known as putinisms.[653] Many of them were first made during his annual Q&A conferences, where Putin answered questions from journalists and other people in the studio, as well as from Russians throughout the country, who either phoned in or spoke from studios and outdoor sites across Russia. Putin is known for his often tough and sharp language, often alluding to Russian jokes and folk sayings.[653] Putin sometimes uses Russian criminal jargon (known as "fenya" in Russian), albeit not always correctly.[654]
Assessments
Z symbol on a billboard reads Russian: За Путина, lit. 'For Putin', 24 September 2022 Assessments of Putin's character as a leader have evolved during his long presidency. His shifting of Russia towards autocracy and weakening of the system of representative government advocated by Boris Yeltsin has met with criticism.[655] Russian dissidents and western leaders now frequently characterise him as a "dictator". Others have offered favourable assessments of his impact on Russia.
Otto von Habsburg, the last crown prince of Austria-Hungary and former Member of the European Parliament, was an early critic of Putin. In a newspaper interview[656] in 2002 and in two speeches[657] in 2003 and 2005, he warned of Putin as an "international threat," that he was "cruel and oppressive," and a "stone cold technocrat".[658]
Putin was described in 2015 as a "dictator" by political opponent Garry Kasparov,[659] and as the "Tsar of corruption" in 2016 by opposition activist and blogger Alexei Navalny.[660] He was described as a "bully" and "arrogant" by former U.S. secretary of state Hillary Clinton,[661][662][663] and as "self-centered" by the Dalai Lama.[664] In 2015, opposition politician Boris Nemtsov said that Putin was turning Russia into a "raw materials colony" of China.[665]
Former U.S. secretary of state Henry Kissinger wrote in 2014 that the West has demonized Putin.[666] Egon Krenz, former leader of East Germany, said the Cold War never ended, adding: "After weak presidents like Gorbachev and Yeltsin, it is a great fortune for Russia that it has Putin."[667]
Many Russians credit Putin for reviving Russia's fortunes.[668] Former Soviet Union leader Mikhail Gorbachev, while acknowledging the flawed democratic procedures and restrictions on media freedom during the Putin presidency, said that Putin had pulled Russia out of chaos at the end of the Yeltsin years, and that Russians "must remember that Putin saved Russia from the beginning of a collapse."[668][669] Chechen Republic head and Putin supporter, Ramzan Kadyrov, stated prior to 2011 that Putin saved both the Chechen people and Russia.[670]
Russia has suffered democratic backsliding during Putin's tenure.[671] Freedom House has listed Russia as being "not free" since 2005.[672] Experts do not generally consider Russia to be a democracy,[673][674][675] citing purges and jailing of political opponents,[676][677] curtailed press freedom,[678][679][680] and the lack of free and fair elections.[681][682][683] In 2004, Freedom House warned that Russia's "retreat from freedom marks a low point not registered since 1989, when the country was part of the Soviet Union."[684]
The Economist Intelligence Unit has rated Russia as "authoritarian" since 2011,[685][686] whereas it had previously been considered a "hybrid regime" (with "some form of democratic government" in place).[687] According to political scientist Larry Diamond, writing in 2015, "no serious scholar would consider Russia today a democracy".[688]
Following the jailing of the anti-corruption blogger and activist Alexei Navalny in 2018, Forbes wrote: "Putin's actions are those of a dictator... As a leader with failing public support, he can only remain in power by using force and repression that gets worse by the day."[689] In November 2021, The Economist also noted that Putin had "shifted from autocracy to dictatorship".[690]
In February 2015, former U.S. Ambassador to Germany John Kornblum wrote in the Wall Street Journal that:[691]
After the 2022 invasion of Ukraine
Streets of Kyiv following Russian rocket strikes on 10 October 2022. Putin has been labeled a war criminal by international experts.[692] Following mounting civilian casualties during the Russian invasion of Ukraine,[693] U.S. president Joe Biden called Putin a war criminal and "murderous dictator".[694][695] In the 2022 State of the Union Address, Biden said that Putin had "badly miscalculated".[696] The Ukrainian envoy to the United Nations, Sergiy Kyslytsya likened Putin to Adolf Hitler.[697] Latvian prime minister Krisjanis Karins also likened the Russian leader to Hitler, saying he was "a deluded autocrat creating misery for millions" and that "Putin is fighting against democracy (...) If he can attack Ukraine, theoretically it could be any other European country".[698][699]
Lithuania's foreign minister Gabrielius Landsbergis said "The battle for Ukraine is a battle for Europe. If Putin is not stopped there, he will go further."[700] President Emmanuel Macron of France said Putin was "deluding himself".[701] French foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian denounced him as "a cynic and a dictator".[702] UK prime minister Boris Johnson also labelled Putin a "dictator" who had authorised "a tidal wave of violence against a fellow Slavic people".[703] Some authors, such as Michael Hirsh, described Putin as a "messianic" Russian nationalist and Eurasianist.[704][705][706]
On 31 December 2022, President Putin gave a New Year's address before a group of soldiers and other members of the Russian armed forces. Questions were raised about whether or not these were actual soldiers or actors. The BBC used facial recognition to identify at least five of the people in the New Year's address as not servicemen but allies or employees of Putin's. A blonde woman standing behind Putin has been identified as Larisa Sergukhina, a member of the United Russia party in the regional parliament for the Novgorod region. Ms Sergukhina has appeared as a soldier, sailor and member of a church congregation in other past public appearances by President Putin.[707]
Electoral history
Personal life
Family
Putin and Lyudmila Putina during their wedding on 28 July 1983 On 28 July 1983, Putin married Lyudmila Shkrebneva, and they lived together in East Germany from 1985 to 1990. They have two daughters, Mariya Putina, born on 28 April 1985 in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg), and Yekaterina Putina, born on 31 August 1986 in Dresden, East Germany (now Germany).[708]
An investigation by Proekt published in November 2020 alleged that Putin has another daughter, Elizaveta, also known as Luiza Rozova,[709] (born in March 2003),[710] with Svetlana Krivonogikh.[4][711] In April 2008, the Moskovsky Korrespondent reported that Putin had divorced Lyudmila and was engaged to marry Olympic gold medalist Alina Kabaeva, a former rhythmic gymnast and Russian politician.[2] The story was denied,[2] and the newspaper was shut down shortly thereafter.[3] Putin and Lyudmila continued to make public appearances together as spouses,[712][713] while the status of his relationship with Kabaeva became a topic of speculation.[714]
On 6 June 2013, Putin and Lyudmila announced that their marriage was over; on 1 April 2014, the Kremlin confirmed that the divorce had been finalised.[715][716][717] Kabaeva reportedly gave birth to a daughter by Putin in 2015;[718][719] this report was denied.[718] Kabaeva reportedly gave birth to twin sons by Putin in 2019.[5][720] However, in 2022, Swiss media, citing the couple's Swiss gynecologist, wrote that on both occasions Kabaeva gave birth to a boy.[6]
Putin has two grandsons, born in 2012 and 2017,[721][722] through Maria.[723] He reportedly also has a granddaughter, born in 2017, through Katerina.[724][725] His cousin, Igor Putin, was a director at Moscow-based Master Bank and was accused in a number of money-laundering scandals.[726][727]
Wealth
Official figures released during the legislative election of 2007 put Putin's wealth at approximately 3.7 million rubles (US$280,000) in bank accounts, a private 77.4-square-meter (833 sq ft) apartment in Saint Petersburg, and miscellaneous other assets.[728][729] Putin's reported 2006 income totaled 2 million rubles (approximately $152,000). In 2012, Putin reported an income of 3.6 million rubles ($270,000).[730][731] Putin has been photographed wearing a number of expensive wristwatches, collectively valued at $700,000, nearly six times his annual salary.[732][733] Putin has been known on occasion to give watches valued at thousands of dollars as gifts, for example a watch identified as a Blancpain to a Siberian boy he met while on vacation in 2009, and another similar watch to a factory worker the same year.[734]
Putin's close associate Arkady Rotenberg is mentioned in the Panama Papers, pictured 2018. According to Russian opposition politicians and journalists,[735][736] Putin secretly possesses a multi-billion-dollar fortune via successive ownership of stakes in a number of Russian companies.[737][738] According to one editorial in The Washington Post, "Putin might not technically own these 43 aircraft, but, as the sole political power in Russia, he can act like they're his".[739] An RIA Novosti journalist argued that "[Western] intelligence agencies ... could not find anything". These contradictory claims were analyzed by Polygraph.info,[740] which looked at a number of reports by Western (Anders Åslund estimate of $100–160 billion) and Russian (Stanislav Belkovsky estimated of $40 billion) analysts, CIA (estimate of $40 billion in 2007) as well as counterarguments of Russian media. Polygraph concluded:
In April 2016, 11 million documents belonging to Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca were leaked to the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and the Washington-based International Consortium of Investigative Journalists. The name of Putin does not appear in any of the records, and Putin denied his involvement with the company.[741] However, various media have reported on three of Putin's associates on the list.[742] According to the Panama Papers leak, close trusted associates of Putin own offshore companies worth US$2 billion in total.[743] The German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung regards the possibility of Putin's family profiting from this money as plausible.[744][745]
According to the paper, the US$2 billion had been "secretly shuffled through banks and shadow companies linked to Putin's associates", such as construction billionaires Arkady and Boris Rotenberg, and Bank Rossiya, previously identified by the U.S. State Department as being treated by Putin as his personal bank account, had been central in facilitating this. It concludes that "Putin has shown he is willing to take aggressive steps to maintain secrecy and protect [such] communal assets."[746][747]
A significant proportion of the money trail leads to Putin's best friend Sergei Roldugin. Although a musician, and in his own words, not a businessman, it appears he has accumulated assets valued at $100m, and possibly more. It has been suggested he was picked for the role because of his low profile.[742] There have been speculations that Putin, in fact, owns the funds,[748] and Roldugin just acted as a proxy.[749] Garry Kasparov said that "[Putin] controls enough money, probably more than any other individual in the history of human race".[750]
Residences
Official government residences
Putin receives Barack Obama at his residence in Novo-Ogaryovo, 2009. As president and prime minister, Putin has lived in numerous official residences throughout the country.[751] These residences include: the Moscow Kremlin, Novo-Ogaryovo in Moscow Oblast, Gorki-9 [ru] near Moscow, Bocharov Ruchey in Sochi, Dolgiye Borody (residence) in Novgorod Oblast, and Riviera in Sochi.[752] In August 2012, critics of Putin listed the ownership of 20 villas and palaces, nine of which were built during Putin's 12 years in power.[753]
Personal residences
Soon after Putin returned from his KGB service in Dresden, East Germany, he built a dacha in Solovyovka on the eastern shore of Lake Komsomolskoye on the Karelian Isthmus in Priozersky District of Leningrad Oblast, near St. Petersburg. After the dacha burned down in 1996, Putin built a new one identical to the original and was joined by a group of seven friends who built dachas nearby. In 1996, the group formally registered their fraternity as a co-operative society, calling it Ozero ("Lake") and turning it into a gated community.[754]
A massive Italianate-style mansion costing an alleged US$1 billion[755] and dubbed "Putin's Palace" is under construction near the Black Sea village of Praskoveevka. In 2012, Sergei Kolesnikov, a former business associate of Putin's, told the BBC's Newsnight programme that he had been ordered by Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin to oversee the building of the palace.[756] He also said that the mansion, built on government land and sporting three helipads, plus a private road paid for from state funds and guarded by officials wearing uniforms of the official Kremlin guard service, have been built for Putin's private use.[757]
On 19 January 2021, two days after Alexei Navalny was detained by Russian authorities upon his return to Russia, a video investigation by him and the Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) was published accusing Putin of using fraudulently obtained funds to build the estate for himself in what he called "the world's biggest bribe." In the investigation, Navalny said that the estate is 39 times the size of Monaco and cost over 100 billion rubles ($1.35 billion) to construct. It also showed aerial footage of the estate via a drone and a detailed floorplan of the palace that Navalny said was given by a contractor, which he compared to photographs from inside the palace that were leaked onto the Internet in 2011. He also detailed an elaborate corruption scheme allegedly involving Putin's inner circle that allowed Putin to hide billions of dollars to build the estate.[758][759][760]
Since the prelude to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Putin prefers to travel in an armored train to flying.[761]
Pets
Putin's pet, named Verni, was a birthday gift from Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, President of Turkmenistan, during a meeting in Sochi in October 2017. Putin has received five dogs from various nation leaders: Konni, Buffy, Yume, Verni and Pasha. Konni died in 2014. When Putin first became president, the family had two poodles, Tosya and Rodeo. They reportedly stayed with his ex-wife Lyudmila after their divorce.[762]
Religion
Putin and wife Lyudmila in New York at a service for victims of the 11 September attacks, 16 November 2001 Putin is Russian Orthodox. His mother was a devoted Christian believer who attended the Russian Orthodox Church, while his father was an atheist.[763] Though his mother kept no icons at home, she attended church regularly, despite government persecution of her religion at that time. His mother secretly baptized him as a baby, and she regularly took him to services.[31]
According to Putin, his religious awakening began after a serious car crash involving his wife in 1993, and a life-threatening fire that burned down their dacha in August 1996.[763] Shortly before an official visit to Israel, Putin's mother gave him his baptismal cross, telling him to get it blessed. Putin states, "I did as she said and then put the cross around my neck. I have never taken it off since."[31]
When asked in 2007 whether he believes in God, he responded: "There are things I believe, which should not in my position, at least, be shared with the public at large for everybody's consumption because that would look like self-advertising or a political striptease."[764] Putin's rumoured confessor is Russian Orthodox Bishop Tikhon Shevkunov.[765] The sincerity of his Christianity has been rejected by his former advisor Sergei Pugachev.[766]
Sports
Putin watches football and supports FC Zenit Saint Petersburg.[767] He also displays an interest in ice hockey and bandy,[768] and played in a star-studded hockey game on his 63rd birthday.[769]
Putin practicing judo in Tokyo, Japan, in September 2000 Putin has been practicing judo since he was 11 years old,[770] before switching to sambo at the age of fourteen.[771] He won competitions in both sports in Leningrad (now Saint Petersburg). He was awarded eighth dan of the black belt in 2012, becoming the first Russian to achieve the status.[772] He was rewarded an eighth-degree karate black belt in 2014.[773]
He co-authored a book entitled Learn Judo with Vladimir Putin in Russian (2000),[h] and Judo: History, Theory, Practice in English (2004).[774] Benjamin Wittes, a black belt in taekwondo and aikido and editor of Lawfare, has disputed Putin's martial arts skills, stating that there is no video evidence of Putin displaying any real noteworthy judo skills.[775][776]
In March 2022, Putin was removed from all positions in the International Judo Federation (IJF) due to the Russian war in Ukraine.[777]
Health
In July 2022, the director of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, William Burns, stated they had no evidence to suggest Putin was unstable or in bad health. The statement was made because of increasing unconfirmed media speculation about Putin's health. Burns had previously been U.S. Ambassador to Russia, and had personally observed Putin for over two decades, including a personal meeting in November 2021. A Kremlin spokesperson also dismissed rumours of Putin's bad health.[778]
The Russian political magazine Sobesednik (Russian: Собеседник) alleged in 2018 that Putin had a sensory room installed in his private residence in the Novgorod Oblast.[779]
The White House, as well as Western generals, politicians, and political analysts, have questioned Putin's mental health after two years of isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic.[780][781][782]
In April 2022, tabloid newspaper The Sun reported that based on video footage Putin may have Parkinson's disease.[783][784][785] This speculation, which has not been supported by medical professionals, has spread in part due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which many saw as an irrational act.[785] The Kremlin[783] rejected the possibility of Parkinson's along with outside medical professionals, who stress that it is impossible to diagnose the condition based on video clips alone.[785]
Awards and honours
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