Putin tear mystery hangs over Russia polls

It was the day Russian state television aired the Soviet classic movie “Moscow Does Not Believe in Tears” and the night its strongman leader Vladimir Putin appeared misty-eyed before the nation.

The big mystery of election day Sunday was not whether ex-KGB agent Putin — a judo black belt known more for his steely resolve then poetic nature — would win but what happened when he walked out victorious before his supporters.

More than 100,000 supporters stood cheering in the howling wind outside the Kremlin while Putin shivered in a black parka on stage and waited for outgoing President Dmitry Medvedev to finish introducing Russia to its next president.

Putin stood calmly. Then he grimaced. Then he swallowed hard and let a tear slip down his right cheek.

It glistened brightly under the spotlights as Putin spoke about Russia’s — and his supporters’ — great might.

“Were the tears real?” one man later asked Putin when he dropped by his Moscow campaign headquarters to thank staff for a result that assured his return to a third term in the Kremlin following a 2000-2008 presidency.

“Well, yes, they were real — real from the wind,” Putin replied.

Not everyone believed him.

“Well, at least that was his explanation for what happened,” Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov later told state television.

And those who did believe the tears were mostly members of Russia’s burgeoning opposition movement whose members have little trust in anything the 59-year-old does.

“Vova, Moscow does not believe in tears,” blogger Slavik Zehner tweeted.

The high-profile opposition leader Alexei Navalny said Putin had every reason to feel depressed upon seeing the state’s carefully orchestrated celebration rally in his honour.

“Today, our leader really had a reason to cry,” Navalny told independent Dozhd (Rain) television.

“He looked at everything around him and said: ‘God, what have I done to this place?’,” Navalny said.