Vladimir Putin was sworn in as president of Russia for a fifth time on May 7, in a ceremony to kick off a new six-year term that was boycotted by most Western countries over his war in Ukraine and an election victory they rejected as being orchestrated to provide him a landslide result.
The 71-year-old Putin took the presidential oath of office in an ornate ceremony in Moscow's Grand Kremlin Palace attended by senior Russian politicians other dignitaries, though noticeably absent were representatives from the United States, Britain, Canada and most European Union members.
Putin -- who has ruled as either president or prime minister since 2000 -- is set to surpass Soviet dictator Josef Stalin's nearly 30-year reign by the end of his new term to become the longest-serving Russian leader in more than two centuries.
He was able to contest the March election, where he won over 87 percent of the vote, by taking advantage of a raft of 2020 constitutional reforms that gave him the right to seek two more six-year terms, meaning he could stay in office until 2036.
Russian elections are tightly controlled by the Kremlin and are neither free nor fair but are viewed by the government as necessary to convey a sense of legitimacy. They are marred by the exclusion of opposition candidates, voter intimidation, ballot stuffing, and other means of manipulation.
"We certainly did not consider that election free and fair but he is the president of Russia and he is going to continue in that capacity," U.S. State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said ahead of the inauguration.
The election was the first since Putin launched his war against neighboring Ukraine in February 2022, and two anti-war candidates were barred from running against him on technicalities.
Meanwhile, his greatest political foe, Aleksei Navalny, died while in a Siberian prison a month before Russians took to the polls.
"War, political assassinations, impoverishment of Russians. There is no prosperity for Russia, no peace and freedom for our citizens," Navalny's widow, Yulia Navalnaya, said in a social media post on May 7.
"Our country is being led by a liar, a thief, and a murderer. But this will definitely come to an end."
Since Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine was launched, relations between Moscow and the West have deteriorated to their lowest level since the end of the Cold War, with Kyiv's Western allies throwing their support behind Ukraine's struggle to repel overwhelmingly superior Russian forces.
Speaking after he took the oath of office, Putin said he wouldn't rule out dialogue with the West, but it needed to be on equal terms and in the meantime, Russia was open to developing relations with other countries he called "the world's majority."
"We believe that the isolation of Russia, and especially of its criminal leader, must be continued," Lithuania's foreign minister, Gabrielius Landsbergis, said in explaining his country's decision to boycott the ceremony.
"Participation in Putin's inauguration is not acceptable for Lithuania. Our priority remains support for Ukraine and its people fighting against Russian aggression."