MOSCOW, Sept 24 (Reuters) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is set to switch roles with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who said on Saturday that he will run for president in March 2012 and proposed that Medvedev become prime minister.
Medvedev will lead the candidate list of Putin’s ruling United Russia party in a Dec. 4 parliamentary election.
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The following are key facts about Medvedev, who was steered into the Kremlin in 2008 by his mentor, Putin:
EARLY LIFE AND CAREER
* Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev was born on Sept. 14, 1965, in St Petersburg, which was called Leningrad at the time. He studied law at St Petersburg State University, graduating in 1987. Putin graduated from the same law faculty in 1975.
* Medvedev went on to teach civil law at the university and worked for the external relations committee of the St Petersburg mayor’s office where he became friends with Putin, who had begun working there after returning from a KGB posting.
* Medvedev also worked as legal affairs director for the Ilim Pulp paper company, which he helped found.
KREMLIN
* When President Boris Yeltsin appointed Putin prime minister in 1999, Putin brought Medvedev to Moscow and named him deputy cabinet chief of staff. After Yeltsin stepped down and made Putin acting President on Dec. 31, 1999, Putin appointed Medvedev as Kremlin deputy chief of staff.
* Medvedev ran Putin’s successful campaign for the March 2000 presidential election and was himself elected chairman of gas monopoly Gazprom that June. He played a key role in helping Putin increase Kremlin control over Gazprom.
* Putin made Medvedev Kremlin chief of staff in 2003. In 2005, he moved Medvedev to the cabinet as first deputy prime minister and entrusted him with high-profile "national projects" to improve healthcare, education, housing and agriculture.
* On Dec. 10, 2007, Putin announced Medvedev was his favoured candidate for president in the March 2008 election, in which Putin was constitutionally barred from seeking a third consecutive term. Medvedev said on the following day that he wanted Putin to be his prime minister.
Medvedev won the presidency on March 2, 2008, with 70.3 percent of the official vote, but criticism of the election by Western governments and Russian opponents took some of the shine off his win. Medvedev was sworn in as president on May 7; Putin became prime minister the next day.
AMBITIOUS PLANS
* Medvedev took office promising continuity in the popular Putin’s policies, but pledging to tackle pervasive corruption, reform law enforcement and the courts, improve the rule of law and strengthen the role of civil society.
The most tangible result of Medvedev‘s police reform campaign is that the militia is now called the police. Between 2008 and 2010, Russia fell from 147th place to 154th, out of 178, on Transparency International’s corruption perceptions index.
* Medvedev has campaigned to modernise and diversify Russia‘s energy-reliant economy, but these plans have gained little purchase with the state bureaucracy and management at state-run firms, including close Putin allies.
Progress has been slow on two trademarks of Medvedev‘s modernisation drive: efforts to create a high-tech innovation incubator at Skolkovo, outside Moscow, and to turn the capital into a global financial centre.
* One of Medvedev‘s major achievements is a thaw in ties with the United States and Europe. He has turned a friendlier face to the West than Putin, making a major shift in tone since Putin slammed the United States in a 2007 speech in Munich.
Medvedev signed the New START nuclear arms reduction pact in 2009 with President Barack Obama, who has taken steps to improve ties with Moscow. Russia and NATO are discussing potential cooperation on the long-divisive issue of missile defence.
PUTIN’S SHADOW
* Medvedev has kept all of Putin’s key ministers in their posts. By far his biggest personnel move was the September 2010 sacking of longtime Moscow mayor Yuri Luzhkov, who had targeted Medvedev in thinly veiled public criticism.
* Medvedev has called for careful steps to increase pluralism after years of tightened control of the political system. But his biggest electoral reform has been extending the presidential term to six years from four, starting in 2012.
He has made clear he will not reverse Putin’s most widely criticised political reform, the abolition of popular elections of Russia‘s regional governors, anytime soon. During Medvedev‘s presidency, mayoral elections have been curtailed.
* Liberals who have latched on to Medvedev‘s promises to break with what he has called Russia‘s "deep totalitarian tradition" have voiced frustration over the lack of changes to redress what they say was Putin’s rollback of democracy.
* Medvedev‘s style differs from Putin’s, and he has at times made assertive remarks seen as veiled criticism of Putin. But he has on several occasions proved unwilling or unable to take action that would strongly set himself apart from his mentor.
In August 2010, Medvedev halted construction of a road through a forest outside Moscow that was backed by Putin but opposed by activists. But he later let it go ahead as planned — a blow to the image of a leader who championed civil society.
The December 2010 conviction and sentencing of ex-tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky after his second trial deepened doubts about Medvedev‘s commitment to improving the rule of law and reaffirmed perceptions of Putin’s dominance.
Medvedev asserted his authority in March 2011 by rebuking Putin for likening the U.N. resolution authorising Western military action in Libya to "medieval calls for crusades". Russia let the measure pass by refraining from using its veto.
In one of his boldest moves, Medvedev on March 31, 2011, ordered the removal of government ministers from state company boards, move that threatens to curb the influence of Putin’s trusted ally and energy tsar, Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin. (Sources: President Medvedev, the Kremlin, Reuters) (Reporting by Alexei Anishchuk, Steve Gutterman and Guy Faulconbridge; Editing by Robert Woodward)
