Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday started a tense summit with Nato leaders amid mounting tensions over United States anti-missile defence plans and the alliance’s expansion toward Russian territory. In a rare moment of cooperation, Russia and Nato concluded a deal on land transit for non-military freight to Afghanistan.
The West cast doubt on Russia’s presidential election on Monday after Dmitry Medvedev won a landslide victory and vowed to follow the course set by outgoing leader Vladimir Putin. Near complete results gave Medvedev 70,2% of Sunday’s vote, crushing his nearest rival, Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov, who won 17,8%.
Georgians began voting on Saturday in a snap presidential election called by fiery pro-Western reformer Mikheil Saakashvili to face down unrest and restore his democratic credentials. The election, where Saakashvili faces six challengers, opened under thick snow in the strategic ex-Soviet republic’s ancient capital, Tbilisi.
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/ 2 December 2007
Russians voted on Sunday in a parliamentary election expected to hand President Vladimir Putin’s party a crushing majority and boost his bid to retain authority after leaving the Kremlin. Polling stations opened in a wave across the world’s biggest country, starting on the Pacific coast.
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/ 18 October 2007
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday announced ”grandiose” military plans, including development of a new nuclear weapon, and attacked United States policies in Iraq and Iran. Putin, who must step down at the end of his second term next year, also confirmed that he wants to retain major political influence.
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/ 12 September 2007
President Vladimir Putin accepted the resignation on Wednesday of his prime minister and government, paving the way for the Russian leader to hand-pick a successor when he steps down next year. The resignation of Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov and the entire Cabinet was shown on state-run Vesti television.
Six years after they first met and United States President George Bush reported gazing into Russian President Vladimir Putin’s soul, the two leaders face some tense talks at the Group of Eight (G8) on Thursday. Bush’s strong personal ties with Putin have been at the heart of US-Russian relations since a summit in Slovenia in June 2001.
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/ 28 December 2006
Moscow says an anti-Kremlin businessman living in Israel could be behind the radiation poisoning of Russian agent Alexander Litvinenko, but the allegation only further complicates a spectacularly bizarre murder case. The prosecutor general said it had found links between the fatal poisoning of Litvinenko and Leonid Nevzlin, a former executive in the Yukos oil company who fled criminal charges in Russia.
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/ 20 December 2006
There is not quite the drama of a Florida hurricane, or the poignancy of stranded polar bears, but Moscow babushka Larisa Bilik is struggling to sell her wool socks — and global warming, experts say, is also to blame. The warmest November-December since records began has put Russia’s fearsome winter on the back foot.
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/ 26 October 2006
Nato Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer urged the Russian Federation on Thursday to lift punitive sanctions against its southern neighbour Georgia during a visit that was intended to ease tensions between the Western military alliance and Moscow. At a Kremlin meeting, the Nato chief and President Vladimir Putin accentuated the positive in what has long been a rocky relationship.