The Albany Gazette - Drones hit Moscow as Russians go to the polls

The ruling United Russia party, which backs President Vladimir Putin and has won every parliamentary election in Russia since 2003, is widely expected to secure another victory against the backdrop of the Ukraine war, now grinding through its fifth year.

Russia's Supreme Court struck the anti-war Yabloko party off the ballot weeks before the vote, while all other parties cleared to run back Putin and the Ukraine offensive.

While the results are unlikely to offer many surprises, the election is the first since Moscow launched its Ukraine military campaign in 2022 and could offer clues about public opinion towards the conflict, Europe's deadliest since World War II.

Putin has urged Russians to take part, casting the vote as a show of support for Moscow's troops and an "answer to those who want to weaken Russia".

The final day of voting was marred by the deaths of two people -- a 44-year-old woman and an elderly man, according to Moscow regional Governor Andrey Vorobyov -- in Ukrainian drone attacks in the capital that wounded some 20 others.

Moscow's Mayor Sergei Sobyanin accused Kyiv of attempting to interfere with the poll, saying Russian air defences had shot down more than 1,600 Ukrainian drones, 450 of which were heading towards the Russian capital.

"The unprecedented attack was clearly planned with the aim of disrupting the elections. The enemy did not succeed," Sobyanin said on Telegram.

Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky praised the strikes, saying: "Our long-range responses had a very significant impact in the Moscow region last night."

A Ukrainian drone strike also hit a bus in part of the country's southern Kherson region occupied by Moscow, killing two people, including a member of the electoral commission, according to the authorities.

- Mobilisation rumours -

Campaigning has been limited in the polls, which will determine all 450 seats for Russia's lower house State Duma and which were set to close at 1800 GMT.

United Russia's main challengers -- the Communist Party, the ultra-nationalist LDPR, A Just Russia and New People -- all support the war and Putin.

Yabloko, a liberal party that has called for an end to the fighting, was barred from running its federal list by Russia's Supreme Court, although its candidates remain on the ballot in some single-mandate constituencies.

Police arrested one of the party's election observers on Saturday, Yabloko said, while one of its former regional chairs was jailed last month for 11 years.

Some fear the post-election period in Russia will bring about a new military mobilisation, similar to the 2022 call-up of 300,000 reservists that triggered an exodus of draft-age men from Russia.

Putin has denied such plans.

The election also comes as Ukrainian drone strikes cause increased disruption and fuel shortages inside Russia, hitting as far as Siberia and the Urals.

In Moscow, one voter told AFP on Saturday they were frustrated by the state of the economy.

"Many people have lost their jobs. Wages are now falling rather than rising," Diana, 30, said.

Another voter, 71-year-old Tatiana, said she had voted for United Russia.

"It is the largest party, the hardest-working and most productive," she said.

- Cyberattacks -

Putin's political opponents have mostly been driven into exile, while his main rival Alexei Navalny died in an Arctic prison in 2024.

Russia's exiled opposition has urged anti-Kremlin Russians not to boycott the elections but instead vote "against Putin's party".

Navalny's widow Yulia Navalnaya called on anti-war Russians to collectively cast their ballots at noon on Sunday, a tactic that drew crowds in the 2024 presidential election.

Yabloko disagreed, arguing that it was better not to vote.

"You are suggesting that we once again go, like sheep, dancing to their tune, and vote for those who have caused the deaths of people in Russia and Ukraine?" party chairman Nikolay Rybakov said earlier this week.

Russia's top electoral official said Saturday Moscow's electronic voting system had been hit by "powerful" cyberattacks.

She also warned that saboteurs had severed communication lines in Russia's far east, in an apparent attempt to frustrate the voting.

"We view the incident as a deliberate act of sabotage and an attempt to disrupt voting in the region," Ella Pamfilova, chair of Russia's Central Election Commission, was quoted as saying by state news agency TASS.

(B.Smith--TAG)