As US, EU friend and foe, Putin has led Russia for 25 years

Vladimir Putin came to power as a professed reformer on the eve of 2000, and has since become one of the 21st century's most prolific warlords. DW looks at how EU, US and NATO relations with Putin's Russia have evolved.

In August 1999, Vladimir Putin was appointed the prime minister of the Russian Federation. Months later, as the world prepared to welcome the year 2000, he succeeded the ailing Russian president, Boris Yeltsin. When he took office, Putin declared that Russia was, and would remain, a great power. In Europe and the United States, he was seen as someone who would restore order within Russia as the country emerged from the tumult of the 1990s.