Alghadeer TV Alghadeer TV
Russia has concluded regional and municipal elections, including in regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia which formally joined the Russian Federation last year, delivering strong support for President Vladimir Putin.
The week-long polls which were wrapped up on Sunday, took place amid Ukraine’s counteroffensive to reclaim territories under Russian control.
In September 2022, Putin signed a decree for the formal accession of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia to the Russian Federation, which came after people in the four regions voted in favor of joining the Russian Federation in a referendum.
According to Russian officials, following last week’s poll, Putin’s United Russia party received large majorities in the above-mentioned regions with more than 70 percent of the ballot in each territory.
Detailed voting figures were not immediately released.
The results mean that Moscow’s handpicked governors in the territories win full terms in office.
United Russia also won every provincial governor’s race it contested across Russia.
The Kremlin said opinion polls and numerous election wins show that Putin is by far the most popular politician in Russia and that elections are free and fair.
Sunday’s results were announced amid claims of vote rigging.
Stanislav Andreychuk, co-chair of Golos, a so-called voter rights group designated a “foreign agent” by the Russian government, claimed that instances of vote rigging in many parts of the country showed that “these are not real elections.”
The Council of Europe, Europe’s leading rights group, also denounced the vote as “a flagrant violation of international law”, with Kiev and its Western backers claiming it was an illegal attempt to tighten Moscow’s grip over regions in Ukraine’s south and east.
