Vladimir Putin: why it’s time for democracies to denounce Russia’s leader as illegitimate

By Stephen Hall, Lecturer (Assistant Professor) in Russian and Post-Soviet Politics, University of Bath

When Russians went to the polls on March 17 to 19, it was less an election than an acclamation.

Putin’s margin of victory – he claimed to have won 87.21% of votes cast – was the largest in the country’s history. It put the Russian president on a par with other great post-Soviet “democrats” Ilam Karimov of Uzbekistan and Heydar Aliyev of Azerbaijan whose vote shares rarely fell below 90% Aliyev…

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