Click here to join our channel indianexpress and stay updated with the latest headlines. Mehr Gill Home Explained Explained: Reading the law that allows Putin to stay Russia President until Explained: Reading the law that allows Putin to stay Russia President until Vladimir Putin, a former KGB officer has run the country for more than 20 years, which is the longest time a leader has been in power since Soviet authoritarian leader Joseph Stalin.
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Some believe he has not found a way to transfer power and ensure that he and his family would remain safe in his retirement. The new law also gives him and former president Dmitry Medvedev lifetime immunity from prosecution.
He returned to the presidency in , provoking protests among his critics on the left and right that were put down harshly. Presidential terms have also been lengthened to six years. The West also accuses Mr Putin of helping pro-Russian rebels in eastern Ukraine with heavy weapons and troops. He admits only that Russian "volunteers" have gone there to help. Mr Putin fumed over what he called the "coup" that forced Ukraine's then-President Viktor Yanukovych to flee to Russia in February The sanctions blocked Western travel and financial services for many of Mr Putin's aides.
Mr Putin appears to relish his macho image, helped by election stunts like flying into Chechnya in a fighter jet in and appearing at a Russian bikers' festival by the Black Sea in The Night Wolves bikers' gang played a prominent role in whipping up patriotic fervour during Russia's takeover of Crimea in But Mr Putin has also shown a gentler side on Russian state media, cuddling his dogs and helping to care for endangered Amur tigers.
That figure would be envied by many Western politicians, though it could suggest that many simply see Mr Putin as a safe bet. He scored political points for keeping Russia relatively stable after the post-communist chaos of the s. Besides restoring widespread national pride, Mr Putin has allowed a middle class to emerge and prosper, though Moscow still dominates the economy and there is much rural poverty. His popularity among older Russians is markedly stronger than among the young. The latter have grown up under Mr Putin and many of them appear to thirst for change.
Thousands of young Russians demonstrated nationwide in January in support of Alexei Navalny, Mr Putin's arch-critic, who was arrested immediately after returning from Berlin.
They were Russia's biggest street protests in recent years, and the police cracked down hard, detaining several thousand. Navalny made a name for himself by exposing rampant corruption, labelling Mr Putin's United Russia as "the party of crooks and thieves". Millions watched a Navalny video about "Putin's palace", a luxury Black Sea estate allegedly gifted to Mr Putin by wealthy friends.
Arkady Rotenberg, a billionaire close to Mr Putin, later claimed to be the owner. Navalny is now in poor health in jail, convicted controversially over an old embezzlement case. His Anti-Corruption Foundation FBK and Western governments called the trial politically motivated and the European Court of Human Rights ruled he should be released from jail because of the risk to his life.
Navalny is another key reason why Mr Putin's relations with the West are so bad now. Mr Putin headed the FSB before becoming president. Novichok - a Russian weapons-grade toxin - was also used to poison Russian ex-spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in England in Russian state agents were blamed for that too. The Skripals survived, but a local woman died.
Mr Putin denied any links to those and other attacks on prominent political opponents. Vladimir Putin grew up in a tough, communal housing block in Leningrad - now St Petersburg - and got into fights with local boys who were often bigger and stronger.
That drove him to take up judo. According to the Kremlin website, Mr Putin wanted to work in Soviet intelligence "even before he finished school". It was better to fight "terrorists" in Syria, he explained, than to wait for them to strike in Russia. He also used the crude language of a street fighter when defending his military onslaught against separatist rebels in Chechnya, vowing to wipe them out "even in the toilet".
The mainly Muslim North Caucasus republic was left devastated by heavy fighting in , in which thousands of civilians died. Georgia was another Caucasus flashpoint for Mr Putin. In his forces routed the Georgian army and took over two breakaway regions - Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
And it showed Mr Putin's readiness to undermine pro-Western leaders in former Soviet states. Putin still in fashion 15 years on. Vladimir Putin's formative German years. Church lends weight to Putin patriotism. Mr Putin's entourage is a fabulously wealthy elite and he himself is believed to have a huge fortune. He keeps his family and financial affairs well shielded from publicity.
The Panama Papers leaks in exposed a murky network of offshore companies owned by a longstanding friend of Mr Putin - concert cellist Sergei Roldugin.
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