Putin's life: How a poor boy from Leningrad became the feared leader of Russia

Russian President Vladimir Putin might currently be the most unpopular leader (a close tie with Kim Jong Un perhaps) in the world. His "special military operation" in Ukraine has affected the entire world and the tactics used by his soldiers have left many disturbed.

Regardless of your opinion about him, one can’t deny that Vladimir Putin is one of the most important figures in the world right now. The story of the president of the Russian Federation, who according to Bloomberg never has had an approval rating below 59%, mirrors closely the story of Russia itself.

Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin was born on October 7, 1952, in St. Petersburg, called Leningrad during the Soviet Union. Young Vladimir was born at the very end of the Stalin years.

Putin’s paternal grandfather served as a cook for Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin. His father, meanwhile, served in the Navy during World War 2 while his mother worked in a factory. Truly, young Vladimir was a son of the Soviet Union.

Young Putin was an avid fan of martial arts, particularly sambo and judo. He credits these activities from keeping him out of the street as a teenager.

He also studied German in high school, a language he remains fluent in. Here a young Putin can be seen in a class photo (top row, fourth from the left) in 1966.

Vladimir Putin graduated with a law in 1975 at Leningrad State University (nowadays St. Petersburg State University).

While in university, Putin met assistant professor Anatoly Sobchak, who would later become his political mentor.

The same year Putin graduated from university, he joined the KGB, the chief Soviet security agency. There’s still controversy about what exactly were his responsibilities within the government entity.

Pictured: Former headquarters of the KGB, which currently serves as the offices of the FSB RF.

What is known is that Putin lived in Dresden, then part of East Germany, from 1985 until 1990.

Pictured: Putin and his parents in 1985, just before moving to East Germany.

He married Lyudmila Shkrebneva in 1983, with whom he had at least two daughters. The couple officially divorced in 2014.

According to Time Magazine, during the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989, he saved the files from Dresden’s Soviet Culture Center and the KGB Villa and then burned the KGB files while handing over the rest to German authorities.

According to Putin, he resigned from the KGB as a Lieutenant Colonel in the middle of the failed coup from Communist hardliners against the government of Mikhail Gorbachev.

Putin returned to St. Petersburg in 1990, where he worked at his alma mater. There, he renewed his friendship with Sobchak.

In this 1993 photo, Putin can be spotted behind Sobchak and Austrian politician Alois Mock during an official visit to the University of St. Petersburg library.

Anatoly Sobchak became the first democratically-elected mayor of St. Petersburg in 1991. As head of the city government, he appoints Vladimir Putin as one of his deputies.

Here, Putin can be seen with Prince Charles during an official visit of The Prince of Wales to St. Petersburg in 1994.

After Sobchak lost the mayoral re-election in 1996, the young Putin, who had been his campaign manager, moved to Moscow to try his luck in federal-level politics.

Putin quickly ascended within the inner circle of Boris Yeltsin, occupying different high-ranking positions, including Director of the FSB RF, the successor of the KGB.

The Russian people became acquainted with Putin as a “law-and-order” politician during the Second Chechen War, which allowed him to surpass his political rivals.

On December 31, 1999, Boris Yeltsin unexpectedly resigned. Putin, who Yeltsin had hoped would succeed him as president of the Russian Federation, took over as acting president.

Putin asked Sobchak in February 2000 to help him in his presidential campaign, but his mentor unexpectedly died not long after meeting him.

Pictured: Putin in 2006, giving a speech at the opening of a monument in memory of Sobchak in St. Petersburg.

Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin was elected President of the Russian Federation on March 26, 2000. Besides a one-term stint as Prime Minister, from 2008 to 2012, he has remained there ever since.