Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, centre, is seen during his inauguration ceremony in Moscow's Kremlin. The Associated Press

Russia's new president, Dmitry Medvedev, was sworn in Wednesday in Moscow and immediately nominated his patron and predecessor Vladimir Putin to be prime minister.

The inauguration ceremony in an ornate golden hall in the Kremlin brings to an end Putin's eight years as president, but the former KGB officer turned head-of-state will continue to wield huge influence in the country.

Medvedev was Putin's handpicked successor, the only serious candidate for Russia's top job. He won a landslide election victory in March.

During the elaborate swearing-in ceremony, Putin called on his successor to continue his policies, which he described as the "right ones" for Russia. In his first speech as president, Medvedev promised to fight corruption and work for greater freedoms for Russians.

"I believe my first aims will be to protect civil and economic freedoms," he said.

Medvedev, 42, takes office as the youngest Russian head of state since Czar Nicholas II, who was deposed by the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917. He has long been associated with Putin, serving him as deputy prime minister in a previous government and also as chairman of Gazprom, Russian's state-run natural gas monopoly and the engine of its petroleum-fuelled economy.

Medvedev has also been Putin's campaign manager and was a consultant to the former president when he was mayor of St. Petersburg in the 1990s.

He has made no secret of his intention to follow in his patron's footsteps, but analysts say Kremlin power struggles have a tumultuous and unpredictable history from czarist times through Soviet Communist rule and up to the present.

CBC's Alexandra Szacka in Moscow says it's difficult to predict how the division of authority between the new president and the future prime minister will translate into political reality.

"Some say the excellent personal and political relationship between them will prevail, but others say there could be a power struggle between puppet, as they say, and puppet master," Szacka says.

With files from the Associated Press