Time magazine named Russian President Vladimir Putin its person of the
year, citing his "steely and determined" imposition of order in a
nation seeking renewed superpower status.
Putin stands for "stability in a country that has hardly seen it
for a hundred years" and is carving out a post-presidential political
role for himself, although he "is not a democrat in any way that the
West would define it," Time said Wednesday in its 2007 citation.
Putin, 55, beat out former US vice president and environmental
activist Al Gore, Harry Potter author J K Rowling, Chinese President Hu
Jintao and David Petraeus, the top US general in Iraq, in the
magazine's list of most influential people over the past year.
US President George W Bush's spokeswoman called Putin "a very intriguing figure."
Time stressed that Person of the Year is not meant as an honour and
said Putin's success came at "significant cost to the principles and
ideas that free nations prize," including press freedom.
But he "has performed an extraordinary feat of leadership in
imposing stability on a nation that has rarely known it and brought
Russia back to the table of world power," the magazine said.
Russia, a "nation that had fallen off our mental map, led by one
steely and determined man, emerged as a critical linchpin of the 21st
century," Time said.
Bush has sought good relations with Putin, despite friction over
issues such as the Iraq war and US plans to set up a missile defence in
Poland and Czech Republic, both former Soviet satellites.
"Obviously he's a very intriguing figure in modern history," White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said of Putin.
