Tyrant of the year 2025: Vladimir Putin

Russia’s “Father of the Nation” Vladimir Putin is overseeing a predictably grim 2025. He continues killing innocent Ukrainians and sending Russian soldiers to their deaths to sustain the ex-KGB agent’s fantasy of conquering Ukraine. He continues to punish anyone inside Russia who dares to challenge the government line, including a street singer who performed songs against the war. Independent journalists remain silenced and opposition leaders languish in prison on charges so absurd they barely pretend to be legal. According to a recent report by Human Rights Watch, (itself designated an “undesirable organisation” in Russia this year alongside organisations like RSF and Amnesty International), the number of political prisoners has climbed into the thousands. But there’s a twist: even the pro-war movement isn’t safe under Putin, who this year turned on several big Kremlin supporters who he designated “foreign agents” following disagreements over the shape of the war.  

Repression is deeply ingrained in public life and is starting younger and younger. “Children are happiness” Putin likes to say, but does happiness look like a forced daily diet of militarised propaganda, which tells kids that dying in war is noble and dissent is dangerous? Does happiness look like the banning of popular apps, recent ones including Snapchat and Roblox? Does happiness look like hundreds of facilities supporting the transfer and “re-education” of Ukrainian children kidnapped from occupied territories, as a 2025 Yale investigation identified?

Putin is no contender for Father of the Year, but for 2025’s Tyrant of the Year? Absolutely.

To cast your vote, click on your chosen tyrant’s face below and then click on the Vote button. And if you want the winner delivered straight to you in early January, sign up to our newsletter – you’ll then be the first to know who claims the crown no one wants.

The closing date is Monday 5 January 2026.

To view the other contenders for Tyrant of the Year, click here.