The Russian opposition urges the international community not to recognize Putin’s victory in the presidential elections |

The Russian opposition has urged the international community not to recognize the results of the elections, which are assumed to end with a landslide victory for the current president, Vladimir Putin. Among protest actions carried out this Sunday in different European capitals such as Berlin, Rome, Paris and Madrid, the protesters have made a call rejecting the “fixing” of the elections and the “dictatorship” of the Kremlin. An initiative, promoted by dissident Alexei Navalny before he died, has called on all those opposed to Putin at noon at the polls, both in Russia and abroad, to show strength, even when the result has already been settled.

With harangues such as “Russia without Putin”, “Putin is a dictator” or “Putin is the devil”, thousands of people have gathered in several cities to cry out against the Russian leader, who will remain in power at least until 2030. In Madrid, the Russian community demonstrated outside the embassy with Ukrainian and peace flags, urging everyone in line to cancel their vote or vote for any candidate except Putin. The Midday initiative against Putin, which has been repeated in other European and world capitals, has sought to boycott the elections. Navalny, the Kremlin’s main opponent, supported the campaign before dying last February in police custody in a Russian Arctic prison. “The action perfectly unites all the components: voting, agitation, physical presence and solidarity with those who will be at the polling station at that moment,” he said then.

Tribute to Russian dissident Alexei Navalny outside the Russian Embassy in Madrid.Diego Stacey

“There is a supposed presidential election in which there is no possibility of rigorously observing the results,” said Xenia Golovina, one of the organizers of the action in the Spanish capital. As the clock pointed to noon, nearly a thousand people joined the queue to vote, so the organizers believe that the campaign has been a success. Liuba Stenyakina was one of the people protesting in Madrid. She went into exile from Russia with his wife for fear that they would be persecuted for being part of the LGTBIQ community. “The situation was getting worse for us every day, so we decided to flee. Today’s Russia is more like the Soviet Union of the 1990s and we didn’t know what could happen to us if we stayed there,” she indicated. Among the protesters were also political refugees, men who refused to serve in the military or citizens who oppose the war with Ukraine.

Polling stations in other EU countries have also been important sources of protest. In Berlin, the demonstration included the participation of Yulia Navalnaya, Navalni’s widow, who also asked through social networks to boycott the results by annulling her vote by writing the name of her deceased husband. In Lisbon, with one of the most active Russian communities against Putin, the action received the support of hundreds of people. “Although we know what the result will be and that most of our voices are going to be stolen, we want to show both the international community and the politicians in Russia that we do exist and that we are not few,” Meri Minashvili says by phone, one of the coordinators of the Free Russians association in Portugal. In Paris, a group has gathered in front of the Eiffel Tower with similar demands.

Although the majority of the demonstrations have been peaceful, in Chisinau, the capital of Moldova, an attack was recorded in the early afternoon with Molotov cocktails that were thrown towards the Russian embassy. The attacker, identified as a 54-year-old man, has been arrested by police. No person from the diplomatic legation or any voter has been injured, according to the TASS agency.

Yulia Navalnaya, widow of Alexei Navalny, queues in front of the Russian embassy in Berlin, this Sunday.Annegret Greetings (REUTERS)

Recognize the result

Among the main demands of this Sunday’s protests is the refusal to recognize the result of the elections, in which a landslide victory for Putin is expected, his fifth in a presidential election. The European Union has already said that it does not believe that they are “free and fair” elections as they do not have opposition candidates and do not have an international observation mission. Despite this, Brussels pointed out that the decision to recognize the result or not depends on each of the Member States. The foreign ministers will meet this Monday and the Russian opposition hopes that some statement will be made on the matter then.

For its part, the United States this week described the elections held in the occupied territories of Ukraine as “false.” “The United States does not recognize and will never recognize the legitimacy or result of false elections held on Ukrainian territory within the framework of the Russian presidential elections,” said State Department spokesman Matthew Miller.

Ukraine indicated to the UN that the votes cast by the citizens of its territory have no international validity and that the elections in its occupied regions “constitute a manifest disregard for the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity.”

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