Putin defends electoral reform against criticism it's retreat from democracy
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MOSCOW  - President Vladimir Putin sought to convince the nation Thursday that his electoral reform was not a retreat from democracy but was needed to save Russia from international terrorists and to limit the political influence of business barons. Putin said in a nationwide television interview his plan to end direct elections of regional governors and parliament deputies will help strengthen the government, which he said was being eroded by ethnic divisions and turf battles between local clans.
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Russia&#39;s lower house of parliament gave tentative backing Friday to a key electoral reform proposed by President Vladimir Putin following a series of recent terror attacks that have killed hundreds and stunned Russians.
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Russia's parliament backed on Friday President Vladimir Putin's plan to scrap elections for governors under sweeping political reforms aimed at strengthening his grip on power.
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Russian President Vladimir Putin defended unpopular social benefit reforms Monday but criticized his government for failing to successfully implement changes that have brought thousands onto the streets in protest.
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Description: Russian President Vladimir Putin recently made sweeping political changes to consolidate his power in the name of a more effective anti-terrorism strategy.
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President Vladimir Putin put sweeping political reforms in motion Monday, sending to Russia's parliament a bill on eliminating the popular election of regional governors and district parliament races.
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WASHINGTON -- A debate is brewing at the highest levels of the Bush administration over whether to adopt a tougher stance toward Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin, who has systematically rolled back democratic freedoms and tried to snuff out democracy in weak neighboring states with little American opposition, according to US officials and policy analysts.
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MOSCOW : Russia&#39;s first post-Soviet president Boris Yeltsin issued a veiled warning that President Vladimir Putin&#39;s decision to hand sweeping new powers to the Kremlin in the wake of the Beslan hostage crisis could roll back democratic freedoms.
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Analysis: Putin may have plenty of narrow political reasons for nixing the province's inevitable breakaway from Serbia, but the effect of delaying it may actually make for a more stable transition
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Russian President Vladimir Putin&#39;s sweeping overhaul of Russia&#39;s political system would consolidate power in the Kremlin at the expense of provincial governments and end Russia&#39;s short experiment with political democracy.
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MOSCOW -- Hundreds of Kremlin critics gathered yesterday on Constitution Day to denounce what they call a retreat from democracy as President Vladimir V. Putin signed a bill scrapping gubernatorial elections.
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President Vladimir V. Putin's plan to concentrate more power in the Kremlin has inflamed popular discontent.
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Russia's first post-Soviet president Boris Yeltsin issued a veiled warning that President Vladimir Putin's decision to hand sweeping new powers to the Kremlin in the wake of the Beslan hostage crisis could roll back democratic freedoms.
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Russian President Vladimir Putin accuses the West of using "double standards" in democratic elections.
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Russian president, Vladimir Putin, dissolves government in lead-up to parliamentary and presidential elections
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Russian President Vladimir Putin, in his first public comment on the dramatic Ukrainian presidential election that the Kremlin-favored candidate lost, said Friday he hopes that the country will move from rhetoric to pragmatism, news agencies reported.
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Russian President Vladimir Putin on  Thursday again ruled out running for a third term in the  Kremlin and pledged to organize elections for a successor in  2008 "in a proper democratic way."