On 14 March 2004, Putin was elected to the presidency for a second term, receiving 71% of the vote.[99] The Beslan school hostage crisis took place on 1–3 September 2004; more than 330 people died, including 186 children.[100]
The near 10-year period prior to the rise of Putin after the dissolution of Soviet rule was a time of upheaval in Russia.[101] In a 2005 Kremlin speech, Putin characterized the collapse of the Soviet Union as the "greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the Twentieth Century."[102] Putin elaborated, "Moreover, the epidemic of disintegration infected Russia itself."[103] The country's cradle-to-grave social safety net was gone and life expectancy declined in the period preceding Putin's rule.[104] In 2005, the National Priority Projects were launched to improve Russia's health care, education, housing, and agriculture.[105][106]
The continued criminal prosecution of the wealthiest man in Russia at the time, president of Yukos oil and gas company Mikhail Khodorkovsky, for fraud and tax evasion was seen by the international press as a retaliation for Khodorkovsky's donations to both liberal and communist opponents of the Kremlin.[107] Khodorkovsky was arrested, Yukos was bankrupted, and the company's assets were auctioned at below-market value, with the largest share acquired by the state company Rosneft.[108] The fate of Yukos was seen as a sign of a broader shift of Russia towards a system of state capitalism.[109][110] This was underscored in July 2014, when shareholders of Yukos were awarded $50 billion in compensation by the Permanent Arbitration Court in The Hague.[111]