©Reuters. A man votes at a polling station during the presidential election in the Chechen capital Grozny, Russia, March 16, 2024. REUTERS/Chingis Kondarov
By Lydia Kelly
(Reuters) – Russia began its final day of presidential voting on Sunday with Moscow accusing Ukraine of using airstrikes to try to sabotage elections that are expected to keep President Vladimir Putin in power for another six years.
According to officials, more than half of Russian voters have already gone to the polls in the first two days of the three-day election. The final day will test the strength of the country’s opposition, which has called on all its supporters to vote at the same time at midday, in an action dubbed “Noon against Putin”.
Sporadic protests have already marked the election, but the latest developments in the war with Ukraine have so far cast a greater shadow on the vote. On Friday, Putin accused Kiev of trying to disrupt the election with its intensified drone and missile attacks inside Russia and on Moscow-controlled Ukrainian territory. He also promised to punish Ukraine.
Local Russian officials said early Sunday morning that Kiev’s forces continued their attacks on Russian regions bordering Ukraine.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy did not address the reported attacks in his nightly video address Saturday, but thanked his military forces and intelligence services “for new long-range Ukrainian capabilities.”
Kiev considers elections held in parts of its territory controlled by Russia to be illegal and null and void. Military analysts see Kiev’s daily pounding, which mainly targets energy and other key infrastructure, as an attempt to shake Russians’ sense of stability and undermine Moscow’s war effort.
‘NOON AGAINST PUTIN’
The war in Ukraine was the deadliest conflict in Europe since World War II. None of the other three candidates on the ballot pose a credible challenge to Putin, 71, who dominates the Russian political landscape.
But supporters of Putin’s most prominent foe, the late Alexei Navalny, who died suddenly in an Arctic penal colony in February, called on citizens across Russia to all vote at the same time on Sunday at noon in each of the country’s 11 times. areas.
The “Noon against Putin” action, supported by Navalny’s widow Yulia Navalnaya, is presented as a way to express opposition without the risk of being arrested because they will queue to vote legally. The Kremlin has warned people against taking part in unauthorized rallies.
“Today we want to say to all of us: noon is the very beginning,” the “Noon against Putin” initiative wrote on Telegram on Sunday morning.
“Yes, some of us are afraid. Yes, the choice is not easy. But we are the people. And we will face both the choice and the responsibility.”
More than 114 million Russians are eligible to vote, including what Moscow calls its “new territories” – four regions of Ukraine that its forces only partially control, but which it claims as part of Russia.
Russia’s Central Election Committee said more than 63 million voters had already gone to the polls on Saturday evening.