Vladimir Putin

Writer Vladimir Voinovich has spent decades skewering Russia's bureaucracy and power structure — and in some cases predicting the future with uncanny accuracy. Soviet officials punished him by stripping him of his citizenship in 1980 and expelling him. Six years later, writing from exile, he published the novel "Moscow 2042. " It described a shrunken, post-Soviet Russia run by a former KGB spy who had been stationed in Germany. That was years before Vladimir Putin, a former spy based in Germany, actually did rise to power.

By positioning himself to regain the presidency next year and perhaps hold the job well into the next decade, analysts say, Vladimir Putin is placing himself above what many Russians expect to be a dirty campaign for parliament this fall and tough economic reforms to follow. His protege, current President Dmitry Medvedev, not so much. Their announcement at a congress of the ruling United Russia party that the two leaders would switch positions allows Putin to protect his image as a populist and a strong leader.

On their dates, he left her waiting, nearly in tears, for as long as 90 minutes at grungy subway stations. His marriage proposal was so blunt and riddled with warnings about his "difficult character" that she thought he was preparing to dump her. When she was about to give birth to their first child, he was away on a business trip, so she hailed a taxi and went to the hospital, where she delivered their daughter alone.

The governor of Russia's Irkutsk region was killed in a helicopter crash along with at least three other people, Russian news agencies reported. Gov. Igor Yesipovsky was appointed in April 2008 by then-President Vladimir Putin. The cause of the accident was not immediately clear, RIA news agency said. Irkutsk is about 3,100 miles east of Moscow and about twice the size of Germany.

Russia's biggest party will invite Vladimir Putin to become its leader, the party's chief said Monday, a role that would further bolster Putin's influence after he steps down from the presidency next month. Putin has said he will become prime minister after his successor, Dmitry Medvedev, is sworn in May 7, but leadership of the pro-Kremlin United Russia party would in effect give him control of parliament, where the party has a large majority.

KARABANOVO, Russia - His unruly mane of white hair giving him the look of Moses, Father Georgy Edelstein struggled over the grayish snow that is the late-spring landscape of this barren village, heading to his church for Good Friday services. When he got to its small, darkened main hall, the 79-year-old put a simple silver cross over his robes and began saying prayers on one of the holiest days in the Russian Orthodox Church. His audience: his assistant and one villager. Two days later, the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, exchanged hearty Easter kisses with President-elect Vladimir Putin amid the lavish interiors of Moscow's Christ the Savior Cathedral, his jewel-encrusted cross and gold brocade robe shining in the television limelight.