The United States considered that the legislative elections held in Russia were neither free nor fair

On Monday, the United States questioned the integrity of Russia’s parliamentary elections, and denounced it The government’s attack on its critics “prevented the Russians from exercising their civil and political rights”, and the process was carried out without transparency or fairness.

Duma elections from September 17 to 19 in the Russian Federation Occurred in circumstances not conducive to free and fair proceedingsForeign Ministry spokesman said.

“We call on Russia to respect its international obligations to respect human rights and fundamental freedoms, and to end the campaign of pressure on civil society, the political opposition and independent media.The statement added.

The opposition, mostly excluded from this election, denounced such as the imprisoned main opponent Alexei Navalny widespread scam The ruling party, United Russia, also claimed an overwhelming majority in the Duma, Parliament.

Despite these accusations, the Russian presidency celebrated the “transparency and integrity” of these legislative elections.

for this part, The European Union denounced on Monday atmosphere of intimidation In the run-up to the elections he regretted the absence of independent election observers.

In turn, the British Foreign Office He noted that “the measures taken by the Russian authorities to Marginalizing civil society, silencing independent media, and excluding real candidates The opposition’s participation in the elections undermines political pluralism and contravenes international commitments signed by Russia. “We are also disappointed by Russia’s unjustified restrictions on election supervision, including international observers, which is an essential component of democratic oversight,” the spokesman added.

Russian communist leader Gennady Zyuganovgenerally restricted, He denounced fraud and urged Putin to stop such “fraud”.

In Moscow, the stronghold of Kremlin critics, They claimed that online voting was rigged, allowing to reverse the unfavorable trend for United Russia observed in paper vote counting. “They are electronic fraud elections.” Ivan Zhdanov, Navalny’s colleague in exile, said on Twitter.

another of his allies, Leonid Volkov denounced a “complete rewriting” of the results in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

This was confirmed by a prominent official in Vladimir Putin’s party, Andrei Turchak Its formation won at least 315 seats out of a total of 450 in the lower house of the State DumaWhich he received a “clear and clean” victory. constitute this result But a decrease for United Russia compared to 2016Where he received 54.2% of the vote, and 334 deputies.

Although Putin, 68, still enjoys a good level of popularityUnited Russia has lost support in the face of deteriorating living conditions after years of economic stagnation, exacerbated by the coronavirus pandemic.

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