KREMLIN

Putin: Russia Is Strong

Despite hundreds jailed after protests.

Russia’s opposition protesters think the election—or, as they would say, “job swap”—of President Vladimir Putin and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev is a joke, but you wouldn’t know it if you saw Moscow’s Red Square. The again-inaugurated president held a WWII victory parade, flanked by military generals. Despite the detention of thousands, Putin said that Russia has the “great moral right to stand up for our positions,” citing the fact that the nation suffered the blow of Nazism. While he’s willing to have a relationship with the U.S., the Russian president said that Moscow and Washington need to be on equal terms. Opposition leaders Sergei Udaltsov and Alexei Navalny are among the hundreds being held by police.