Dmitry Astakhov / Ria Novosti via Reuters

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev stands in his office in Moscow on April 9, 2013, before an interview with a Russian television channel.

As Russian President Vladimir Putin continued a European trip marked by protest, his successor as Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev was left looking rather wistful at his office back in Moscow Tuesday.

Since Putin and Medvedev swapped jobs in May last year, the latter has found himself out of the limelight and has even found time to indulge his passion for photography.

NPR's Moscow correspondent Corey Flintoff reported earlier this month that Medvedev appears increasingly isolated from the center of power and may have been the target of a campaign to wreck his reputation.

Putin, who was confronted by topless protesters in Germany on Monday, faced further demonstrations in the Netherlands, where 1,000 gay rights activists waved pink and orange balloons and blasted out dance music to condemn Russia's treatment of homosexuals. 

AFP - Getty Images, RIA Novosti via AP

Russian President Vladimir Putin had a busy day Monday: (clockwise from top left) Sitting in a Volkswagen XL 1 Hybrid car in Hanover, Germany; laughing with German Chancellor Angela Merkel; arriving at Schiphol airport in The Netherlands; drinking a toast with Dutch Queen Beatrix at the Hermitage Museum in Amsterdam.

Robin Utrecht / EPA

Demonstrators participate in a protest near the National Maritime Museum, where Putin was having dinner, in Amsterdam on April 8, 2013. The protesters were denouncing a so-called 'homosexual propaganda ban' in Russia which was enacted in January.

Previously on PhotoBlog: On holiday with Putin and Medvedev

Maxim Shipenkov / EPA

Masked investigators carry confiscated documents and equipment from the apartment building in which opposition leader Alexei Navalny resides after they finished a raid of his flat, in Moscow, Russia on Monday. Investigators and police officers, some with machine guns, stormed the homes of several Russian opposition leaders on 11 June, one day ahead of a planned mass rally by opponents of President Vladimir Putin. The so-called 'March of Millions' opposition rally, which was permitted by the city authorities, is to take place in Moscow on the 'Day of Russia' celebrated on June 12.

Mikhail Voskresensky / Reuters

A journalist films the apartment of opposition leader and anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny after it was searched by police in Moscow.

Maxim Shipenkov / EPA

Police officers armed with automatic rifles stand guard at the entrance of the house where an opposition leader Alexei Navalny has his flat as oppossition supporters wait nearby in Moscow. One of the supporters holds an iPad decorated with a poster picturing Alexei Navalny with the words beneath it 'Because we exist.'

Msnbc.com's World News blog reports that raid signals a tougher approach to dissent at the start of President Vladimir Putin's six-year term:

After tolerating the biggest opposition protests of his 12-year rule while seeking election, Putin now looks intent on damping down unrest.

On Friday he signed a law that increased fines, in some cases more than 100-fold, for violations of public order at gatherings including street demonstrations, ignoring warnings from his human rights council that it was unconstitutional.

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Ivan Sekretarev / AP

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who claimed victory in Russia's presidential election, tears up as he reacts at a massive rally of his supporters at Manezh square outside the Kremlin on March 4, 2012.

Msnbc.com news services report — His eyes brimming with tears, Vladimir Putin defiantly proclaimed to a sea of supporters that they had triumphed over opponents intent on "destroying Russia's statehood and usurping power."

Putin said the presidential election, which official figures said he had won with more than 63 percent of the vote, had prevented Russia from falling into the hands of enemies. Complaining of widespread fraud, his opponents said they would rally near the Kremlin on Monday night.

Monitors cited "serious problems" with the vote and called for alleged electoral violations in Sunday's election to be thoroughly investigated.

See more images of Vladimir Putin on PhotoBlog.

Maxim Shipenkov / EPA

People look at the screen providing images from a network of surveillance webcams installed at polling stations all over the country at Russia's Central Election Commission (CEC) in Moscow on March 4, 2012.

Sergei Karpukhin / Reuters

A cafe employee poses for a picture as she drinks from a cup, containing coffee latte with cinnamon powder illustration of Russia's Prime Minister and presidential candidate Vladimir Putin seen on the milk skin, at the Kofein cafe in Moscow on Wednesday. The coffee chain offered its visitors to take part in a symbolic presidential election by ordering a cup of coffee displaying their favorite candidates, while showing the results of votes on a screen nearby. The Russian presidential elections are scheduled for March 4.

Sergei Karpukhin / Reuters

Cups, containing coffee latte, are on display, with cinnamon powder illustrations of presidential candidates Vladimir Putin (C top), Gennady Zyuganov (R top), Vladimir Zhirinovsky (L bottom), Sergei Mironov (R bottom) and Mikhail Prokhorov seen on the milk skin, at the Kofein cafe in Moscow on Wednesday.

Related story: Putin says he may face runoff in Russia's election 

Denis Sinyakov / Reuters

A migrant worker wearing a Russian cartoon hero 'Luntik' costume takes a break from his work of distributing advertising leaflets at metro station in Moscow on Nov. 23, 2011.

Reuters photographer Denis Sinyakov spent nine months documenting the lives of Russia's enormous and mostly illegal migrant work force in the lead up to presidential elections that take place next month.

Russia’s demographic situation is one of the many contributing factors to the uncertainty facing the country. Not only does Russia have a decreasing population, but the chaos of the 1990s has created a situation where there are fewer young adults now than should be expected in a standard population. The result is a small, indigenous labor pool and a large influx of migrant workers to fill the gap. These workers are mainly from former Soviet countries in Central Asia – Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan – places with their own economic problems, which also encourages migration.

Denis Sinyakov, Reuters photographer based in Moscow writes:

Denis Sinyakov / Reuters

Migrant workers work unload potato sacks at a vegetable market on the outskirts of Moscow on Nov. 11 2011.

Denis Sinyakov / Reuters

Migrants workers from Tajikistan relax on the roof of their shelter after working at local market outside Moscow, July 18 2011.

I don’t remember a time when Moscow hasn’t been flooded with them, migrants from Central Asia.

 When I moved here in 1997 they were already here. They had started appearing more than 20 years ago, the time when the Soviet Union was falling apart. Some fled civil wars, but more usually they were escaping the awful economic situation in their homelands. Not exactly an escape, but they came to make some money, leaving their families at home. The economic situation in Russia even now isn't enviable, at the beginning of the 1990s it was woeful, but none the less better than there.

 Muscovites have got used to living with them, used to regarding them as low qualified workers, as street sweepers and lorry loaders, cheap muscle on building sites. People are used to calling them “churki” and “sheep” and not finding those words in any way offensive.

Muscovites are generally not very tolerant people towards aliens, and aren't very fond of newcomers from the varied different regions of the Russian federation, or the Caucuses or from Central Asia. But only the latter group has it become habitual to offend in public.

 When I started to shoot this story I saw the following scene:  two women arguing about a dog belonging to one of them that was swimming with children in a river one hot July day.  In the same place migrants from Tajikistan were swimming, they were about half of the bathers present.

The women were shouting and arguing for a long time about the hygiene of the dog. Bystanders became involved and eventually sided with the dog owner, arguing that it was permissible since there were already several “darkies” swimming in the same place, so the water could hardly be considered clean. The darkies, deeply tanned only on their necks and forearms, listened silently and continued swimming and didn't pay any attention to what was happening. Everybody is used to it, but I felt deeply ashamed.

 That's what I wanted to photograph, but it seemed impossible. The unpleasantness of locals to the immigrants is an intangible, a mentality ingrained as part of the status quo, easy to seem unremarkable and by its nature unnoticed. However there are so many aspects to this relationship that reflect a multitude of issues confronting Russia at the beginning of the 21^st century.

Denis Sinyakov / Reuters

Muslim migrant workers attend special prayers on the first day of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha in Moscow on Nov. 6 2011

Denis Sinyakov / Reuters

Migrant workers from Tajikistan bathe in the Yauza river outside Moscow, July 6 2011

Denis Sinyakov / Reuters

Migrants workers from Tajikistan gather in a shelter to watch TV after working at a local market outside Moscow, July 6 2011.

Click here see more of Denis Sinyakov's photographs of "Russia's Untouchables" and read more about his experience covering the story.

Related Links:

• Putin: Crackdown needed on illegal immigration

Andrey Smirnov / AFP - Getty Images

A detained illegal immigrant from Uzbekistan, looks from his cell through a dirty glass window with a grate at police station in Kazansky (Kazan) railway station in Moscow on Jan. 24, 2012. Police detained about 30 migrants during a routine check at a railway station in Moscow on Tuesday. In a far-ranging article published earlier on his campaign website, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said that he planned to toughen up immigration legislation.

Reuters reports from MOSCOW:

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has warned ethnic tensions could tear Russia apart, saying he would toughen migration rules on reassuming the presidency and keep a tight rein on Russia's regions to prevent it following the Soviet Union into oblivion.

Putin, in power since 2000 and favored to win a six-year presidential term in March, described a Soviet-style vision of a country in which the rights of ethnic minorities would be respected but Russian language and culture would dominate. Continue reading.

Andrey Smirnov / AFP - Getty Images

A police officer, right, locks up a detained illegal immigrant from Uzbekistan in a cell at Kazansky railway station on Jan. 24, 2012.

Denis Sinyakov / Reuters

Anti-corruption blogger Alexei Navalny speaks with journalists as he leaves a police station on the day of his discharge in Moscow on Dec. 21, 2011. Navalny was arrested at an opposition protest in Moscow on December 5.

Reuters reports from MOSCOW:

 Opposition leader Alexei Navalny used his release from jail on Wednesday to call on Russians to unite against Vladimir Putin whom he said would try to snatch victory in a March 4 presidential election that was sure to be unfair.

Navalny, who has harnessed a mood change among Russia's urban youth against Putin's 12-year rule, was greeted by chants of 'Navalny, Navalny' and applause from supporters who braved a blizzard to await his release from a Moscow police station.

Initially weary and dazzled by scores of television camera lights, Navalny swiftly embarked on a dissection of the disputed December 4 parliamentary election, brandishing his slur of Putin's ruling party as a collection of "swindlers and thieves."

"The party of swindlers and thieves is putting forward its chief swindler and its chief thief for the presidency," Navalny, dressed in jeans and holding a plastic supermarket bag full of clothes, told reporters after his release.

"We must vote against him, struggle against him," Navalny said. "If he does become president, he will not become a legal president, it will be an inherited throne."

Navalny, a 35-year-old anti-corruption blogger, was detained on December 5 for obstructing justice at an opposition protest in central Moscow against alleged vote rigging in the parliamentary election. He was sentenced to 15 days in jail. Read the full story.

Mikhail Voskresensky / Reuters

Policemen detain activists from the Other Russia opposition movement during a rally to protest against the first session of Russia's State Duma and violations during the recent parliamentary elections in Moscow on Dec. 21, 2011.

Ivan Sekretarev / AP

Police officers detain a protester outside the State Duma, the Russian Parliament's lower chamber, during its first session after recent elections, in downtown Moscow on Dec. 21, 2011.

Previously on PhotoBlog:

• Russians demand new elections, protest Putin's rule
• Russians claiming election violations protest in Moscow
• Scenes from the Russian election
• Russians vote in election test for Vladimir Putin
• Exhibition of Russian opposition leaders and their thoughts on the future of their country

Mikhial Metzel / AP

Demonstrators shout during a mass rally to protest against alleged vote rigging in Russia's parliamentary elections in Moscow, Russia, Saturday, Dec. 10. Russians angered by allegedly fraudulent parliamentary elections are protesting Saturday in cities from the freezing Pacific Coast to the southwest of Russia, eight time zones away, a striking show of indignation, challenging Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's hold on power.

From msnbc.com staff and news service reports:

Protesters waved banners such as "The rats should go!" and "Swindlers and thieves - give us our elections back!" in cities from the Pacific port of Vladivostok in the east to Kaliningrad in the west, nearly 7,400 km away.

Anton Golubev / Reuters

Interior Ministry officers stand guard during a rally to protest against violations in the parliamentary elections near St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow, Dec. 10. Tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets of cities across Russia on Saturday to demand an end to Vladimir Putin's rule and to complain about alleged election fraud in the biggest show of defiance since he took power more than a decade ago.

Riot police were out in force with dogs and in trucks, but they did little to douse protests that showed a groundswell of discontent with Putin as he prepares to reclaim the presidency next year, and anger over the December 4 election which the opposition says was rigged to favor his United Russia party.

"Today 60,000, maybe 100,000 people, have come to this rally," former prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov said in a speech to flag-waving and chanting protesters packed into Bolotnaya Square across the Moscow River from the Kremlin.

"This means today is the beginning of the end for these thieving authorities," said Kasyanov, who now leads an opposition movement which was barred from the election.

Read the full story here.

Yuri Kadobnov / AFP - Getty Images

Opposition activists protest at the Bolotnaya Square in central Moscow, on December 10, 2011.Tens of thousands of election protesters turned out today in Moscow and other major cities across Russia in open defiance to strongman Vladimir Putin's 12-year rule.