Vladimir Putin defends decision to go for third term

HE MAY be the overwhelming favourite, but this weekend Vladimir Putin was placed in the position of defending his decision to stand in next year’s presidential election in Russia.

At a dinner in Moscow with foreign specialists on Russia, Putin, who first held the role of president 12 years ago, denied it was a quest to retain personal power, insisting that he needed longer to raise living standards and make Russia stronger.

The Valdai Club, as the group of foreign experts has become known, are granted an annual face-to-face meeting with Putin in which they are invited to discuss the state of Russian politics with the man most likely to win the next Russian presidential election.

Some times he summons the group to his Black Sea villa in Sochi, at other times, the encounter is at a government guest-house outside Moscow. This year the club was taken to the livery yard in the countryside outside Moscow where Putin keeps his horses.

There, the group were treated to shots of vodka and Italian wine at a nearby luxury restaurant, although Putin himself was three and a half hours late.

His excuse was that the prime minister preferred to wait until the Friday night rush hour had subsided as Moscow drivers caught up in the city’s traffic jams became irritated when his governmental cortege, flanked by outriders and police cars, overtook them all.

Leather-bound fake books and a grand piano added to the convivial atmosphere at the gathering. Behind glass cabinet doors, there was an impressive array of Armagnac with labels going back to the 1880s.

“We thought it would be more cosy to meet here,” explained one of his aides, “less formal than a government guest house.”

During the dinner the group presented Putin with a report warning him his way of ruling Russia had almost run its course and could not go on forever.

Putin told the group: “Of course our system is not perfect,” adding he was aware of the shortcomings of his dual rule with President Dmitry Medvedev popularly dubbed a “tandem”.

“But I do not know any system of governance which is perfect,” added Putin, who announced the decision to seek his third term as president in September.

Putin took a dig at Britain’s political system where his “good friend” former prime minister Tony Blair was replaced as the head of government by Gordon Brown “without any election, as a result of manipulations inside the party”.

“We are not acting like this, we are going to election.

“We are going to the election and offering our people the chance to reach their verdict on what we have done in the past and on our programme for the future development,” Putin said, defending his past track record as president and prime minister.

Speaking for the Valdai Club, Timothy Colton from Harvard University told Putin: “The current political system in Russia, which formed over the last ten to 12 years, has exhausted its capacity or is close to it.”

Putin remains Russia’s most popular politician and is an ultimate decision-maker despite stepping down as president in 2008 and formally serving as a second in command to his anointed successor, Medvedev.

Putin plans to run in the March 2012 presidential election and his popularity ratings show that he is set to win. But Putin’s decision to return infuriated his critics at home and abroad who said he will lead the country into stagnation.

The scholars said Putin told them during a part of the meeting that was closed to media that the dual rule would continue after the election with Medvedev holding sway over the economy as prime minister.

“He wanted to say that the tandem is not dead, that Medvedev is not a beaten card,” political scientist Alexander Rahr said after the meeting. Rahr said that Putin warned the experts that further development of the US missile defence programme could lead to a “serious tension” with Russia in the future.

Columbia University professor Robert Legvold said Putin saw fighting nuclear weapons proliferation as a foreign policy priority during his presidency. He said Putin dodged several questions on Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

Putin, who previously evoked long-serving historical figures such as US president Franklin Roosevelt to justify his comeback, praised Italy’s outgoing prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, calling his 17-year tenure “a stability factor”.

“I have a very warm personal relationship with Berlusconi. I believe that he is one of the greatest European politicians,” Putin said.

Putin added that the Italian statesman exposed his sex life “consciously, in order to attract attention”.

Berlusconi resigned last night, making way for an emergency government and ending one of the most scandal-plagued eras in Italy’s post-war history.

Putin also recalled his private conversations with the former German chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, another European ally, who told him that Berlusconi was a “good man” but “not a real politician”.