The European Parliament did not recognize the results of the elections to the Russian State Duma
The European Parliament refused to recognize the results of the elections to the Russian State Duma and declared that it considers the formed parliament to be illegitimate.
European Parliament did not recognize the results of the elections to the Russian State Duma
The document, adopted on October 8, was supported by 482 deputies, 41 voted against, and another 39 abstained. It notes that due to the "systematic exclusion and persecution of democratic and anti-war political forces, serious violations, and the lack of fully independent observation," the elections were not free and fair.
The deputies also pointed out pressure on voters, obstruction of observers' activities, and restricted political competition, drawing particular attention to the exclusion of the "Yabloko" party from the elections. The holding of the voting process in the occupied territories of Ukraine, as well as in Transnistria, Abkhazia, and South Ossetia, was also strongly condemned.
Taking these and other factors into account, the European Parliament stated that "the official results cannot be considered a reliable expression of the political will of the Russian people." The resolution says, "These circumstances deprive the State Duma formed as a result of the elections, as well as the legislative acts and political decisions adopted by it, of democratic legitimacy."
The European Parliament called on the Council of the European Union and its member states to pursue a similar policy of non-recognition, to refrain from official contacts with the new composition of the State Duma, to prevent the participation of Russian deputies in inter-parliamentary assemblies, and to introduce sanctions against "persons responsible for undermining the possibility of holding free and fair elections in Russia."
"By staging these elections, the Russian government pursued only one goal - to create a false impression of Putin's electoral legitimacy, his continuous policy of domestic repression, and most importantly, that his aggressive war against Ukraine is supposedly legitimate," the document says.
The elections to the State Duma of the IX convocation took place on September 18–20. The CEC announced the victory of the "Yedinaya Rossiya" party, which won a record 349 mandates. At the same time, according to calculations by independent election analysts, more than 18 million out of 30 million "paper" votes may have been fraudulently "stuffed" in favor of the ruling party, and its actual result does not exceed 35 percent.