...Second President of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Because of constitutionally mandated term limits he is the current Prime Minister of Russia. His sock puppet, Dmitry Medvedev, was installed in the 2008 presidential elections. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law. During his eight years in office Russia's economy bounced back from crisis, seeing GDP increase, poverty decrease and average monthly salaries increase. During his presidency Putin passed into law a series of fundamental reforms, including a flat income tax of 13%, a reduced profits tax, and new land and legal codes. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile...after the March 4 presidential elections, Channel One state television
... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
said Monday.
The station showed two men who said they were acting on the orders of Chechen warlord
Doku Count DokuUmarov
... Self-styled first emir of the Caucasus Emirate. Count Doku has announced that his forces will not target civilians, but qualified that statement by saying there aren't any civilians in Russia...
. They said they prepared the attack in the Ukrainian port city of Odessa and were planning to carry it out in Moscow.
The station said three plotters came to Ukraine from the United Arab Emirates via Turkey with "clear instructions from representatives of Doku Umarov."
One of the men died in a blast in early January that prompted the investigation, the report said.
"They told us that first you come to Odessa and learn how to make bombs," the station showed a man identified as Ilya Pyanzin as saying.
"And then later, in Moscow, you will stage attacks against commercial objects, with the subsequent liquidation attempt against Putin," the man said.
The state television
... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
footage, which was apparently shot in Ukraine, showed a video of Putin getting into his car being played on the laptop computer belonging to the second tossed in the clink man, identified as Adam Osmayev.
"This was done so that we had an understanding of how he was protected," Osmayev said.
"The end goal was to come to Moscow and to try to stage an liquidation attempt against premier Putin," Osmayev said.
"The deadline was after the election of the Russian president," Osmayev said.
Putin is widely expected to return for a third term as president in March 4 elections after serving two terms in 2000-2008 in which he waged a brutal campaign against Moslem Death Eaters in the North Caucasus republic of Chechnya.
The region remains wracked by violence to this day and Umarov -- who has grabbed credit for some of the deadly suicide kabooms in Moscow -- remains on the lam.
Putin's official front man said he can confirm the Channel One report but could not provide a more detailed comment at this time.
"I confirm this information but not commenting at this time," ITAR-TASS quoted front man Dmitry Peskov as saying.
The report said one of the two jugged men had told Russian and Ukrainian Sherlocks that some explosives had already been hidden near Kutuzovsky Prospekt -- the avenue Putin passes daily to reach the government White House.
It further quoted an unidentified Russian Federal Security Service
... the successor to the KGB...
(FSB) official as saying that the explosive found near a road would have created a blast powerful enough to severely damage Putin's vehicle.
"This would have been a serious blast," the FSB official told Channel One.
"It would have been enough to tear apart a truck."
There was no immediate reaction to the report from kavkazcenter.com, a website Umarov and other Islamic fascisti use regularly to communicate their messages.
Putin is facing four weak challengers in Sunday's election and widely expected to win the vote in the first round with support of about 60 percent.