While he does seem to genuinely care about Russia — it was under his presidency that alot of the mass capitalist privatizations after the USSR’s overthrow were undone and life in Russia started to catch back up to what it was, though it remained capitalist — he’s still a liberal. I imagine that’s probably because of a mix of wanting to increase his chances of victory even a bit more, and because there’s no genuine leftist opposition in Russia right now that would actually improve it (all his genuine oppositions have been far-right so far).