Foreign policy names Putin world’s 2nd most powerful person

Russian President Vladimir Putin leads the ranking of the world’s most powerful people compiled by US magazine Foreign Policy.

No one is in first place, as “in a G-Zero world, everyone is waiting for someone else to shoulder responsibility for the world's toughest and most dangerous challenges,” the magazine said.

“The leaders you'll see named further down this list are preoccupied with local and regional problems and don't have the interest and leverage needed to take on a growing list of transnational problems,” it said.

Putin therefore takes second place in the Foreign Policy ranking. “In Russia's personalized system, this is still the person who counts. He isn't as popular as he used to be, and his country has no Soviet-scale clout or influence, but no one on the planet has consolidated more domestic and regional power than Putin,” the magazine said.

The Russian president is followed by US Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, who is ranked third, German Chancellor Angela Merkel (4) and US President Barack Obama in fifth place.

Then come European Central Bank head Mario Draghi (6), Chinese Communist Party Secretary General Xi Jinping (7), Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei (8), International Monetary Fund chief Christine Lagarde (also 8) and Saudi King Abdullah Bin Abd al-Aziz (10).

Putin was ranked the third most powerful person in the world by Forbes magazine in its annual rating in December. US President Barack Obama topped the list for a second year in a row.