Putin Party Wins Landslide Victory in Russia Election
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - The United Russia party backed by Russian President Vladimir Putin has won a landslide victory in parliamentary elections, the Central Election Commission said after 93 percent of ballots had been counted.
The results mean the ruling party is on track to win 343 seats or 76 percent of 450 available seats in Russia's Duma. They also indicate support for President Putin and his United Russia Party remains strong despite sanctions and economic difficulties.
The 63-year-old Putin, after 17 years in power as either president or prime minister, still enjoys a high personal approval rating of about 80 percent.
The Communist party was in second place with 13.5 percent of the vote, outstripping the ultra-nationalist Liberal Democrats on 13.3 percent. The Just Russia party won 6.2 percent, according to the incomplete vote count.
Putin, speaking to United Russia campaign staff a few minutes after polling stations closed, said the win showed voters still trusted the leadership despite an economic slowdown made worse by Western sanctions over Ukraine.
"We can say with certainty that the party has achieved a very good result; it's won," Putin said at the United Russia headquarters, where he arrived together with his ally Dmitry Medvedev, who is prime minister and the party's leader. "We know that life is hard for people, there are lots of problems, lots of unresolved problems. Nevertheless, we have this result."
Putin's aides are likely to use Sunday's result, which leaves United Russia by far the biggest party, as a springboard for his own campaign for re-election in 2018, though he has not yet confirmed that he will seek another term, TeleSUR reported.
Voting began early morning Saturday local time on the Chukotka Peninsula opposite Alaska and wrapped up in Kaliningrad, Russia's most westerly point, where people cast their vote until late Sunday evening.
Anxious to avoid a repeat of 2011's street protests, Kremlin officials have tried to assure Russians that the vote will be the cleanest in the country's modern history. Observers from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe are being allowed to monitor the vote.
The authorities have also resurrected an old voting system viewed as more equitable, which means that half of parliament will be decided by people voting for individuals with the other half drawn from party lists. The last parliament was elected on party lists alone.
