a first day of voting marked by damage to polling stations

The vote, which runs from Friday to Sunday, should see the master of the Kremlin reappointed for an additional mandate of six years, the opposition having been eradicated.

At least thirteen people were arrested for damage to polling stations on Friday March 15 in Russia, on the first day of a pre-determined presidential election. The vote which runs from Friday to Sunday should see the master of the Kremlin reappointed for an additional mandate of six years, the opposition having been eradicated.

The precise motives of those arrested have not been made public. A woman was arrested after setting fire to a voting booth in Moscow, according to Russian media, while a second, aged 20, tried to throw a Molotov cocktail at a polling station in Saint Petersburg, according to a local manager.

One person was also arrested for trying to set fire to a ballot box in Khanty-Mansisk in Siberia and another for trying to light a firecracker at a polling station in the Chelyabinsk region, not far from the Ural Mountains.

UN condemns holding of polls in occupied Ukrainian regions

Six people were also arrested for pouring dye into ballot boxes near the Russian capital, in Siberia and in the regions of Voronezh (west), Rostov-on-Don (southwest) and Karachay-Cherkessia. , in the Caucasus. The head of the electoral commission, Ella Pamfilova, claimed that these people were acting for money promised by “bastards, from abroad.”

In the occupied part of the southern Ukrainian region of Kherson, a bomb exploded without causing any casualties in front of a polling station, local authorities denounced. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres condemned “the efforts of the Russian Federation to organize its presidential election in the regions” from Ukraine “illegally” passed under his control.

The Moscow prosecutor’s office warned Thursday against any protest action, as no criticism or opposition is tolerated in Russia. Vladimir Putin, who voted online, for his part assured that the Ukrainian strikes against Russian territory, which have intensified in recent days, would not remain “unpunished”.