Country going through difficult period: Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Putin on Thursday urged Russians to stay the course in the face of a «difficult period», hours before polls open in a vote set to extend his hardline rule.
The former KGB agent is set to secure another six-year term this weekend in a vote the Kremlin says will show society is fully behind his assault on Ukraine.
«I am convinced: you realise what a difficult period our country is going through, what complex challenges we are facing in almost all areas,» Putin said in an address to Russians on the eve of the vote. «And in order to continue to respond to them with dignity and successfully overcome difficulties, we need to continue to be united and self-confident,» he added.
Victory in the March 15-17 contest will allow Putin to stay in the Kremlin until at least 2030, longer than any Russian leader since Catherine the Great in the eighteenth century. Appointed by his predecessor Boris Yeltsin on the final day of 1999, Putin has ruled Russia as president or prime minister ever since.
His first years in office saw an economic boom as Moscow cashed in on its vast energy resources. But under his rule, Russia became increasingly authoritarian at home, eventually cracking down and outlawing all forms of dissent.
And abroad, Putin ramped up confrontation with the West and dispatched troops into Ukraine — annexing Crimea in 2014 and backing separatist rebels in the eastern Donbas region before launching his full-scale offensive in 2022.
With all his
