Vladimir Putin has secured another six-year term as Russian president, exit polls showed Sunday, paving the way for the hardline former spy to become the longest-serving Russian leader in more than 200 years.
Victory for the 71-year-old was never in doubt, with all his major opponents dead, in prison or exiled, and authorities waging an unrelenting crackdown on those who publicly oppose the Kremlin or its military offensive on Ukraine.
The government-run VTsIOM pollster projected that Putin had sailed to an easy victory with 87 percent of the vote after polls closed in Russia’s western-most region of Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea.