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Vladimir Putin

President of Russia

Moscow, Russia

Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin has been elected three terms as the leader of Russia and held the office of prime minister as well. He was brought into the world in Leningrad, now St. Petersburg, Russia on October 7, 1952. He attended local grammar and high schools and then continued to college at Leningrad State. While there he completed a law degree in 1975. He married Lyudmila in 1983 and they have two daughters. The couple divorced in 2013 with Lyudmila saying they just never saw each other and their girls were grown and on their own.

Putin began work in the Russian government with his job in the main security agency as an intelligence officer. During this time, he was stationed primarily in East Germany until 1990 when he retired as a lieutenant colonel. Putin was promoted from Head of Federal Security to Prime Minister by Yelstin in 1999. He was elected to his first term in 2000 and quickly set about restructuring the Russian government. Putin was re-elected in 2004. However, he was not allowed to run for the third time in a row but was again made prime Minister.

Initially, the Russian government was supportive of the United States after the September 11 attachs. However, in 2013 there were strained relations with the United States over chemical weapons in Syria. In 2014 Vladimir ran again and was successful in gaining the Presidency for the third time. Later in 2014 they hosted the Winter Olympics and there was controversy over Russia's anti-gay policies. Athletes were assured they would be treated graciously no matter what their sexual preference was.

Putin is an Orthodox Christian who attends church on a regular basis. He is known for helping to rebuild churches and construct new ones. He wants to unify religion under the government. Religious groups are required to register with the government for approval.

(By Biopage writers. Phone credit The Kremlin Moscow and Ed Parsons. Please contact Biopage for inaccuracy)

On Social Media

How does Putin think he's doing? The portrait of him I want to read is his own. Nothing we know about him suggests a strong introspective bent, but let's imagine him opening up to his workout buddy, Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev. “Listen,” he might say, “I've been in power longer than any other world leader, but no one seems to want me at their meetings. Our economy isn't in free fall anymore, but I have no idea how to end the recession. I'm trying out some anticorruption rhetoric, but honestly it's only talk. I laughed off the Panama Papers, but they made me nervous as hell. I picked a human-rights activist to head the Central Election Commission, but just for show. I brag about having restored order in Russia, but Chechen gangsters enjoy free rein in Moscow. I'm no longer set on breaking up Ukraine, but I can't find a way out either. I showed Obama military power could produce results in Syria, but now I seem to own the damned place. And that withdrawal I announced? Didn't mean it. “Between us, Dmitri - I'm out of answers.” (By Stephen Sestanovich, the U.S. ambassador-at-large for the former Soviet states. Photo credit Sasha Mordovets - Getty Images

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