Bethlehem

Vladimir Vladimirovitch Putin (in) was born the October 7th 1952 in Leningrad (today Saint-Pétersbourg). He is the president of the Fédération of Russia since May 2000.

Professional path

Vladimir Poutine makes studies of right to the Université of Leningrad where it obtains in 1975 its diploma with a report devoted to the policy of the United States in Africa. Anatoli Sobtchak, at the time professor with the university and future mayor of the city, is his academic supervisor.

After a formation in Moscow, he becomes member of the KGB, where he is useful during fifteen years within the “First head office”, the intelligence service outsides, in particular in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. In 1985, it will be sent in German Democratic republic, in the Group of the armed forces stationed on the spot. It spends five years to Dresden where, under the cover of director of the “House of the friendship germano-Soviet”, it works for the KGB.

The rise towards the capacity

With the reunification of Germany and the dismantling of the installations of the KGB with Dresden, Putin will be put in reserve, going back to Leningrad at the beginning of 1990 as an assistant with the international businesses of the vice-chancellor of the University of Leningrad. This same year, Sobtchak invites it to become to advise with the international businesses of the Soviet of the city. In August 1991, he plays a part invisible, but crucial, in the delicate negotiations between the KGB of Leningrad and the military structures related to the putschists of the Kremlin.

He resigns officially of the KGB on August 20th, 1991 with the rank of lieutenant-colonel. From June 1991 in July 1996, Putin is one of the most influential personalities of the municipal policy, the “cardinal of the shade”, officially as president of the Council of the city. It is responsible for the foreign relations of the town hall of Saint-Pétersbourg, and, as from 1994, first assistant of the mayor Anatoli Sobtchak (who was his professor with the Faculty of Law).

With the autumn 1995, this last appoints it president of the local section of “Our House Russia” (Nach Dom Rossia - NDR), the party of the Tchernomyrdine Prime Minister. It will be charged to direct the countryside of the legislative elections in the area for the account of NDR. There will remain faithful to Sobtchak in spite of the defeat of this last to the municipal election of 1996, refusing to work with Iakovlev, of fear of giving the “appearance of treason”. He resigns in 1996.

He is then named in Moscow associated with the director of the businesses of the Presidency, Boris Eltsine. In March 1997, it enters the presidential administration to become vice-president about it less than one year, equipped later with extended capacities, including with the management of the relationships to the areas. In July 1998, it is named director of FSB (Federal security service), station which it will occupy only one month, until the nomination of Evgueni Primakov like Prime Minister. This period is marked by intense political struggles which cause to weaken Eltsine, physically and politically.

In 1999 one fulgurating rise begins, which will carry this man little known and of rather dull appearance at the top of the capacity to Russia. In August, it is named Prime Minister by Boris Eltsine, Stépachine having been isolated. At the beginning of September are allotted to the Terroristes Tchétchènes of the attacks against residential buildings which made several hundreds of victims in Moscow. Putin declares that it “will butt the terrorists until in the toilets”, meaning by there that they were going to be tracked in their last cuttings off and shot down without pity . Following the intrusion of a thousand of islamist tchetchenes in Daghestan and the risk of an introduction of the charia, it orders, after ultimatum, the resumption of the hostilities in Chetchnia, “to restore the federal constitutional order there”.

December 31st, 1999, following the resignation of Boris Eltsine, he becomes President by interim and is elected President on March 26th, 2000 as of the first turn of the presidential election anticipated with 52,52  % of the votes. It takes up duties officially on May 7th.

Vladimir Poutine with the orders of Russia

Since then Vladimir Poutine, given to restore what it calls “the vertical of the capacity”, controls with an authoritative style which put an end to a relative liberalization introduced by Gorbatchev with the Perestroïka and the Glasnost and which had continued under the mode of Boris Eltsine after the fall of Communism. During his two mandates, president Putin did not cease reinforcing the weight of the special services from which it is resulting, as well as those of the police force and army, those which one calls in Russian the siloviki ( men of forces ). The representatives of the “bodies” and influential people resulting from his birthplace of Saint-Pétersbourg ( piterskiïé ) are henceforth quite present in the policy and the presidential administration. Together, they form, writing Macha Lipman, analyst with the Carnegie Foundation, “a closed vertical system”.

The resumption in hand of the law and order by the administration of Putin, after the periods of disorders and leave-to make which reigned under its predecessors, satisfied most of the Russian, wearied population political sudden starts and capitalism version " far-west" appeared after the fall of Communism, or nostalgic of the power of the past.

A certain number of Western leaders appreciate the fact that Vladimir Poutine could found a solid economy, favorable to the commercial exchanges and favourable with the great contracts. Dominique Chews, Conseil in energy, former chairman of Schlumberger in Ukraine, however gives a pessimistic vision of the economic future of Russia in a article published in Le Monde, heading Russia, gas power with the feet of clay . These assertions are however relativized by the encouraging results of the Russian economy, by its strength structural and a substantial rise of monetary reserves (303,8 billion $US to the 26  January 2007 against 12 mds $US in 1999), and of the Funds of Russian stabilization resulting from the surpluses of petrodollars, called to serve as “cushion of safety” if the oil courses should decrease. Moreover, the sector pétrogazier would represent only 18,9  % of Russian GDP in 2007 and it must fall down to 14,9  % in 2010.

Pessimism is not shared by the German ex-chancellor Gerhard Schröder, currently president of the Board of trustees of the German-Russian gas consortium North-European Gas Pipeline Co (held with 51  % by Gazprom), which warned, at the time of a meeting Russo-allemande in Berlin the 18  January 2007, against “the typical errors made in the appreciation of Russia and of its president in Occident”. According to him, “the Russian president succeeded in substantially raising the standard of living in the country and restoring the State”, and it would have “the historical merit to have engaged Russia on the way of stability and reliability as a partner”. Recognizing that, in many fields, Russia “is only at the beginning of a long and difficult way”, Gerhard Schröder invited the adversaries of Russia not to seek defects in her actions and of the insufficiencies from the point of view of the Western democracy, but to support her efforts made in her progression towards the democracy. “Certainly, Russia has insufficiencies, but no one knows them better only the leaders Russian and null will be able to surmount them better only they”, underlined the ex-chancellor.

President Putin and oligarchs

At the beginning of her mandate, Vladimir Poutine posted in a given way her objective to fight against the para-étatique Maffia and of the Oligarque S industrialists and financial, whose seizure on the Russian economy became a major concern of the population after one era of laissez-faire and complicity of Eltsine in the creation of this oligarchy. Thus, several of its oligarchs who had then monopolized the resources and the industrial inheritance while benefitting from the gaps of the right of the businesses of transition, were put at the steps or continued by justice (p.ex. the banker Sergueï Mavrodi). Such Khodorkovski, ex-owner of the oil group Ioukos, condemned to eight years of prison for swindle and tax avoidance with large scales, interned in a camp of work in Siberia. According to the Vedomosti agency, experts believe that Putin sees in the person of Mikhaïl Khodorkovski a political adversary. " The authorities fear a setting in anticipated freedom of Mr. Khodorkovski, an aggravation of the interior political situation to the approach of the elections and, of course, a multiplication of the lawsuits abroad " , the vice-president of the Russian Union of the industrialists and the contractors adds, Igor Iourguens.

Some marked oligarchs of crimes and economic frauds and penal were withdrawn from Russian justice while fleeing abroad, such Boris Berezovski or Vladimir Goussinski, whose General prosecutor of Russia requires the extradition for proven cases of frauds and tax avoidance. Other oligarchs approached the capacity and obtained stations within official structures, n the other hand of a setting to the service of the country of their fortunes often well badly acquired: it was the case of Roman Abramovitch, Anatoli Tchoubaïs or Vladimir Potanine. Lastly, some seem to always enjoy a certain impunity, such Pavel Fedoulev which, in September 2000, seized the metallurgical combine of Ouralkhimmach, with the assistance of the OMON (special forces of the Ministry for the Interior). President Putin did not intervene in his opposition, although with his come to power he stated to wish the introduction of a “dictatorship of the law”. Long series of privatizations disputed in Russian metallurgical industry, started in 1991, continuous under the government of the president Putin .

At the end of the day, if Russia were raised economically and if the financial and economic legislation and the regulation made notable progress, force is to note that Vladimir Poutine could not éradiquer completely consecutive corruption with the bankruptcy of the Soviet Union and at the period of liberalization without control which followed under Eltsine.

Foreign politics

The foreign politics under Putin marks a certain rupture in the continuity of a diplomacy eltsinienne which tried to balance a partnership (ren) forced with the Occident. This come to power of Putin to the favor of the fast and military resolution of the conflict as Chetchnia and in the search of a " prestige" of a lost super power, reinforced by a spectacular economic revival facilitated by the increase of the courses of gas and oil, made possible the development of new military doctrines (April 2000) in which the reinforcement of the Russian military apparatus should serve the interests geostrategic of the State without being concerned with " considerations occidentales". This Russian repositioning predicted, then, that an agreement between the the United States and the Russia would not be perfect.

The terrorist attack of the September 11th, 2001 transformed gives it geostrategic for the Russia and gave an impulse to the establishment of relations more brought closer with the the United States. The posted support of Putin for its American counterpart in its fight against terrorism establishes a climate of a certain cordiality and a new alliance between the two powers. A pragmatic and realistic perception of the international stakes, as well on the Russian side as on the American side made it possible Russia to return in force on the international scene by playing a prevalent part in the fight against the Terrorisme or in the attempts at mediation in the complex conflicts like the files Palestinian or Iran IEN.

For a few years, following the economic recovery, the Russian complex militaro-industrialist has been renewed, thanks to the entries of the new generations of the armaments and the massive and structured purchases.

Today, the Russian géostratégie, such as it is conceived by Vladimir Poutine, cannot be apprehended without conceiving the growing importance of the energetic sector (gas and Pétrole) in economic and political terms. Indeed, Russia is the first world producer and the first world gas exporter and the 2nd producer and major exporter of oil. Its gas reserves rise with more 23  % of world reserves. Taking into account its geographical location, Russia is the first supplier of the European Union (30  % of the consumed gas) whose request is in constant progression. With its control of hydrocarbons, Russia currently holds an unequalled geopolitical position by which it tries to reinforce its place of major actor in the “Big game” of the superpuissances ( Voir also: Geopolitical Gazprom and of oil ).

At the beginning of 2007, vis-a-vis the projects of installation of the American defense systems anti-missile in the Eastern Europe (presented by the USA like a protection against possible Iranian nuclear attacks, but which de facto weakens the Russian nuclear deterrence vis-a-vis the USA), Putin raises the tone in its relations with the the United States and NATO. Its speech, marked on February 10th, 2007 in front of the Conference of Munich on safety, pitilessly fustigated the bringing together of the troops of NATO of the borders of Russia, as well as a unipolar world with " Washington for center of direction" , which would impose its interior laws and its own vision of the world on the whole of the international community. June 4th, 2007, the day before the top of G8 with Rostock, Vladimir Poutine threatened to point new missiles towards Eastern Europe if the United States deploys their anti-missile shield there, thus taking again with the more high level buckled threats expressed up to now by the chiefs of the Russian army.

Socio-economic reforms and policies under Mr. Putin

At the beginning of her mandate, Vladimir Poutine engages of important socio-economic reforms and policies which appreciably transformed Russia.

In the economic domain:

• tax reform: installation of a single rate of 13  % for the income tax, introduction of a unified social tax, lowers rate of the VAT, reduction of the rate of the corporation taxes of 35  % with 24  %, which made it possible to simplify the taxation and to limit the fraud and corruption;
• land reform introducing the right to sell the arable lands;
• four laws of official deregulation, aiming at reducing the bureaucratic control of the companies;
• opening to the competition of the railway freight representative 80  % of the traffic of the goods in the country.

The academician Nina Koulikova, of the Institute of Europe of the Academy of Science of Russia, presented, in November 2005, a relatively optimistic point of view on the results of economic reforms of Putin. She recalled that the market economy is recent in Russia, that she can build herself only with time, and she indicated which should be “the future axes of the reforms”. Considering the economic recovery of Russia right now sufficient to allow him to again play a part of balance on the international scene, without offering for as much, far is necessary oneself some, for its population a standard of living comparable with that of Western Europe, it distinguished the various phases in the economic recovery from Russia after the crisis of 1998. According to Koulikova, with the come to power of Putin, a first stage of “stabilization being completed by the installation of the bases on which the country could start again its economic development” would have been reached. Since, the growth would have been primarily a “growth of re-establishment”, resting on “the re-enlisting in the production of the capacities not used during the crisis”. This “growth of gradually becoming exhausted re-establishment”, progressively diminution of production capacities available and usable, the problem would be, since 2003, to support a “growth of investment”, which would depend less on the economic reforms than of the development of the political institutions and legal, in particular administrative (deregulation) and legal (independence of justice). The political elite and economic of Russia perceives more and more the range of these problems, while an special attention is given to the administrative reform and legal, ensured it. According to Koulikova, Russia had entered in 2005 a “stable stage of development of the institutions of market” and that “thanks to acquired stability, the country undertook to build economic institutions specific to the company contemporary and directed towards the characteristics of Russia.”.

According to the Russian president itself, in 2006, Russia recorded an economic growth of 6,9  %. In an interview granted to the Indian television channel Doordarshan , Vladimir Poutine declared that Russian monetary reserves are with the third position in the world and are in constant evolution, before being pleased with a budget and a balance of the foreign trade surplus. According to the Russian Minister for Economic development and Trade Guerman Gref, the Russian GDP calculated in dollars has triplet of 2000 to 2006, while the market cap doubled in 2005 and progressed into 2006 of 53  %. According to the report/ratio of OECD of 2004, the rise of the oil prices cannot, with it only, to explain this recovery. This rise contributed to increase the GDP on average 1  % per annum, 4-6  % remaining being ascribable to successes of the recent structural reforms, the productivity gains and the strength of the inner demand.

In the social domain:

• reform of the retirements: installation of a system with three pillars with obligatory capitalization and voluntary saving, without increasing the retirement age;
• installation of the Projects of national priorities and the demographic policy in order to reform the social sector and to finance great projects in the field of health, education, the accessibility of the social housing, the support for the agricultural sector and the rise of the birthrate.

According to the President of the Duma Boris Gryzlov, the triennial budget federal 2008-2010 would give the priority to the raising of the standard of living of the Russians, his party pro-Putin plain, majority Russia at the Duma, proposes to increase by 1,5 times the real wages in the public sector and to double the retirements.

In the political arena, the reforms were centered on the creation of a “vertical of the capacity” in order to make the last more concentrated and effective (this process was accelerated following the tragedy of Beslan on September 1st, 2004):

• reform of territorial division with the creation of seven federal Districts by order in Council N 849 of May 13rd, 2000;
• reform of the the Council of the Federation of Russia (2000-2002), and the stop of the elections of the governors of the subjects of the Federation which will henceforth be indicated by the president of the country with later ratification by the local legislation (September 2004) ;
• creation of consultative bodies: of a Council of State (Gossoviet), consisted of the governors and a Room of the company (Obchtchestvennaïa Palata), formed of influential and known personalities;
• installation of measurements ensuring a better cohesion enters the ministries for the law and order known as siloviki (Interior, Armée, FSB) and the ministry for the Emergencies.

The success of these reforms, coupled to extraordinary revenues from taxes resulting from the sale of hydrocarbons, made it possible to ensure a substantial rise of the real income of the private individuals (+ 58,5  % between 1999 and 2002, + 13,55  % in 2004). That was worth with V. Putin the support of most of the Russian population, in spite of some failures as a controversial bill on the monetization of the advantages in kind inherited the Soviet era which raised, at the beginning of 2005, a popular outcry or the shipwreck of the submarine Koursk sunk in 2000 with 118 men of crew on board

Critics of the capacity of Vladimir Poutine

Many Western observers estimate that there would be an authoritarian abuse of Vladimir Poutine. In October 2006, Marie Mendras, enquiring with CERI and professor of Russian policy to IEP of Paris, drew up a negative assessment of the political power in Russia:

There is no more neither Parliament nor Constitutional court worthy of this name, the government is shorted-circuit by the presidential administration, the judges are subjected to the political power as soon as a business becomes delicate. That brings back for us to the problem violence and impunity. Désinstitutionnalisation of the mode, opacity of the decisions, rise of arbitrary and the expeditious methods: all that represented an increasing agitation of the leader circles.

For the newspaper Vedomosti , “the level growing of the criminality and the number of verdicts odd and curiously lenient do nothing but reinforce the feeling of injustice within the Russian company. ”

Defense associations of the Human rights, whose, in Russia, Memorial, founded by Andrei Sakharov, just as a minority of opponents, estimates that the Rule of law is threatened in Russia and denounces the self-censorship of the media. Indeed, several independent titles of press, as well as television channel NTV, repurchased by Gazprom and other structures controlled by the State, seem to have reduced their critical glance.

Demonstrations of part of the opposition called " Steps of the dissension " , organized by the plain civic Face, chaired by Garry Kasparov (former world champion of failures) and Mikhaïl Kassianov (former Russian Prime Minister), to which however the most important parties of the opposition to the Duma (Communist party, Rodina, LDPR), did not take part, are often prohibited for various reasons by the authorities. This movement gathers various political movements, of left and right-hand side, and the nationalist groups and extreme right-hand side (including mobilities openly fascistic or Nazis)  . The Steps of the dissension which representative of the parliamentary opposition to plain Russia, did not start from Vladimir Poutine, gather few participants however (in the neighborhoods of five thousand on average, for a population of 13 million inhabitants with Moscow).

Political future

Vladimir Poutine, who arrives at the end of its second presidential mandate (it was re-elected with the head of Russia in March 2004 with 71,22  % of the votes), stated not to intend to require a modification of the Constitution in order to aspire to a third consecutive mandate in March 2008. It was satisfied to make adopt two laws, one which regards as valid the poll whatever the participation, the other aiming at prohibiting the demonstrations in election time. .

The analysts currently wonder which would be a possible designated successor of Vladimir Poutine in 2008. Although officially the current chief of the Kremlin does not have advanced any name, among the probable dolphins one generally quotes Dmitri Medvedev and Sergueï Ivanov, the two vice-first-ministers, or Viktor Zoubkov, the new Russian Prime Minister. , .

Not having the possibility of representing itself as a president, Vladimir Poutine created sensation by announcing her will to take the head of the electoral campaign of December 2007 of the party plain Russia to aim at the load of head of government, which would enable him to preserve some to be able while respecting the constitution. 

Private life

Vladimir Poutine is resulting from a working-class family of which he is the third child. His/her father Vladimir Spiridonovitch and his mother Maria Ivanovna, born Chelomova, who had survived the 900 days of the Siège of Leningrad during the Second world war, had before had two wire born in the Thirties, but deceased in low age. His/her grandparents were peasants of the village of Pominovo, in the district of Tourguinov, (province of Tver), an area located at the north of Moscow. According to a biographer of Vladimir Poutine, the grandfather, Spiridon, were the first of the line to be born after abolition from serfdom in the empire from the tsars. It is in certain connections an atypical Russian leader. Relatively young person, it is an accomplished sportsman: he practices the Russian fight, the Sambo and the Judo since the 11 years age (he was several times champion of sambo of Saint-Pétersbourg; in 1973, he saw himself conferring the title of Master of the sports of Sambo, in 1975, of Judo), plays Tennis, made Ski.

He usually speaks the German , having lived and having worked several years in East Germany. He also speaks the English, but prefers to use interpreters while conversing with the english-speaking. 

He married Lioudmila Aleksandrovna Poutina in 1983 (born Chkrebneva on January 6th, 1958 with Kaliningrad and graduate of the Faculty of Arts of the university of Volgograd) and is father of two girls, Maria (born in 1985 in Leningrad) and Ekaterina (born in 1986 in Dresden).

Oecumenism

Orthodoxe practitioner, Vladimir Poutine carries out in 2007 a visit with the the Vatican with an aim of facilitating a bringing together between the Russian orthodoxe Église and the Roman Catholic church. The meeting between the pope and the high Russian prelates is a big step in the catholic-orthodoxe dialog. It had also met Jean-Paul II twice in 2000 and 2003.

Random links:

Silk Air | Route main road 800 | Alberto Malik | List nuclear plants of Switzerland | Adrien Beaudry

© 2007-2008 speedlook.com; article text available under the terms of GFDL, from fr.wikipedia.org