From reformer to hardliner: Putin's 20 years on the global stage

Putin's approval ratings remain at a level most Western leaders would envy but they have taken a hit from a stalling economy and declining living standards. [AFP]

Twenty years ago on Friday, Russian President Boris Yeltsin appointed his fourth prime minister in less than 18 months: Vladimir Putin, then a relatively unknown security services chief with scant experience of politics.

The departing Yeltsin was casting around for a successor and few could have predicted that two decades later Putin would still be ruling Russia, having taken on a dominant role in world affairs.