...Second President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Because of constitutionally mandated term limits he is the current Prime Minister of Russia. His sock puppet, Dmitry Medvedev, was installed in the 2008 presidential elections. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law. During his eight years in office Russia's economy bounced back from crisis, seeing GDP increase, poverty decrease and average monthly salaries increase. During his presidency Putin passed into law a series of fundamental reforms, including a flat income tax of 13%, a reduced profits tax, and new land and legal codes. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile...cancelled his keenly awaited visit to Islamabad earlier this week.
Addressing a joint media briefing after completing his consultations with Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, visiting Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov endorsed Pakistain's stance on drone attacks.
"We are working on both proposals of Mr Putin visiting Pakistain or
President Asif Ali Ten PercentZardari
... husband of the late Benazir Bhutto, who has been singularly lacking in curiosity about who done her in ...
travelling to Russia. It is still unclear which one finally works out," a foreign ministry official said.
The visit would be worked out through diplomatic channels, he said.
Mr Putin had invited Mr Zardari to Russia while conveying regrets for his inability to come to Islamabad for a quadrilateral summit on Afghanistan and bilateral talks.
Mr Lavrov, who had rushed to Islamabad, according to Ms Khar on "a two-day notice", after postponing his visit to New Delhi, for damage control, insisted that the Russian president had pulled out of the visit only due to "scheduling issues".