Who is Vladimir Putin?

Vladimir Putin was born on October 1, 1952, in Leningrad, now St. Petersburg, Russia. His father, a decorated war veteran, was a foreman in a metal factory. He died in August of 1999, the week his son was appointed the prime minister of Russia. Putin’s mother, who did not work outside the home, died a year and a half before that. Growing up in Leningrad, Putin lived with his parents in a communal apartment with two other families. Though religion was not permitted in the Soviet Union, his mother secretly had him baptized as an Orthodox Christian. He remains a practicing member of the Church and delivered a Christmas Eve speech in Moscow in 1999. On March 26, 2000, Russians elected Putin out of a field of 11 candidates, including Communist leader Gennady Zyuganov, who won 42 percent of the vote in a tight race in 1996 against Yeltsin. Putin won with 52.6 percent of the vote as compared to runner-up Zyuganov, who gathered 29.3 percent. After his election, Putin’s first legislative initiative, in April of 2000, was to win approval of the Start II arms reduction treaty from the Duma. The deal, which was negotiated seven years earlier, involved decreasing both the Russian and American nuclear buildup by half.

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