Amid warfare disaster, Putin turns 70 with a prayer for his well being By Reuters

By Man Faulconbridge and Mark Trevelyan

LONDON (Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin turned 70 on Friday amid fawning congratulations from subordinates and a plea from Patriarch Kirill for all lay and clergy to wish for the well being of the longest serving paramount chief of Russia since Josef Stalin.

Putin, who rose to the Kremlin’s high job on the final day of 1999, is going through the largest problem of his rule after the invasion of Ukraine triggered the gravest confrontation with the West for the reason that 1962 Cuban Missile Disaster.

On his birthday, Putin is because of attend a casual summit of the Commonwealth of Impartial States in St Petersburg, the previous imperial capital based by Peter the Nice that’s his hometown.

Obsequious officers hailed Putin because the saviour of recent Russia whereas the patriarch of Moscow and All Russia implored the nation to say two days of particular prayers in order that God grants Putin “well being and longevity”.

“We pray to you, our Lord God, for the top of the Russian State, Vladimir Vladimirovich, and ask you to provide him your wealthy mercy and generosity, grant him well being and longevity, and ship him from all of the resistances of seen and invisible enemies, affirm him in knowledge and religious energy, for all, Lord hear and have mercy,” Kirill mentioned.

Putin, who vowed to finish the chaos which gripped Russia after the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union, is going through probably the most critical warfare disaster any Kremlin chief has confronted for a minimum of a era for the reason that Afghan warfare of 1979-89.

Opponents similar to jailed opposition chief Alexei Navalny say that Putin has led Russia down a useless finish in direction of destroy, constructing a brittle system of incompetent sycophants that may finally collapse and propel Russia into chaos.

Supporters say Putin saved Russia from destruction by an smug and aggressive West. They are saying he has clawed again clout after the humiliations suffered by the Russian elite because the Chilly Struggle ended.

However Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has thus far floundered.

After greater than seven months of warfare, Russia has suffered large losses in males and tools and been overwhelmed again on a number of fronts throughout the previous month as Putin’s military has lurched from one humiliation to the following.

Putin has resorted to proclaiming the annexation of territories solely partly underneath Russian management – and whose borders the Kremlin has mentioned are but to be outlined – and threatening to defend them with nuclear weapons.

A partial mobilisation declared by the president on Sept. 21 has unfolded so chaotically that even Putin has been pressured to confess errors and order modifications. A whole bunch of hundreds of males have fled overseas to keep away from being known as up.

Even usually loyal Kremlin allies have denounced the failings of the navy – although they’ve stopped brief, thus far, of criticising the president himself.

Reflecting on Putin’s birthday, former Kremlin speechwriter Abbas Gallyamov mentioned: “On an anniversary, it is customary to sum up outcomes, however the outcomes are so deplorable that it will be higher not to attract an excessive amount of consideration to the anniversary.”