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A combo photo of Moscow mayoral candidates Aleksei Navalny (left) and incumbent Sergei Sobyanin
A combo photo of Moscow mayoral candidates Aleksei Navalny (left) and incumbent Sergei Sobyanin

Russia's Regional Elections: Liveblog

The upstart candidacy of Russian opposition leader Aleksei Navalny has shaken up the first Moscow mayoral election in a decade. Although Kremlin-backed incumbent Sergei Sobyanin was widely expected to win easily, Navalny supporters hoped he could get enough support to force a runoff. Throughout Russia, thirty-three provinces were voting on September 8 to elect eight governors, 16 regional assemblies, and the mayors of 11 regional capitals.

15:30 9.9.2013
Final update:

-The official vote count gives Sobyanin 51.33 percent and Navalny 27.27, meaning there will be no runoff.


-The Navalny campaign has accused the Election Commission of voter fraud and has demanded a runoff. He has called for people to come out to protest tonight.

-Navalny's campaign exit polls said he received 36 percent of the vote to Sobyanin's 46, which would have forced a runoff. Polling from the state-run Public Opinion Foundation, however said Sobyanin got 56 percent to Navalny's 29 percent.
-In Yekaterinburg, Russia’s fourth largest city, Yevgeny Roizman, a 50-year old anti-narcotics campaigner and controversial opposition activist, has declared victory.

-United Russia dominated everywhere else. Preliminary results show the ruling United Russia party gubernatorial candidates winning in Moscow Oblast, Vladimir Oblast, Khabarovsk Krai, Zabaikalsky Krai, Khakasia, and Magadan Oblast.
09:23 9.9.2013
Initial official results: 51.37 percent for Sobyanin and 27.24 percent for Navalny, meaning that there will be no runoff.
04:52 9.9.2013
Sobyanin just met supporters at the Pushkin Museum, where they celebrated "victory."

"The main thing is not to rock the boat," he said. "My main competitor was the problems of Moscow."

02:04 9.9.2013
Aleksei Navalny just spoke for the last time tonight. He demanded that all votes cast outside polling centers (aka "home votes") be annulled; he demanded a second round; and called for people to join him in demonstrations tomorrow.

01:01 9.9.2013
00:29 9.9.2013
Sobyanin just spoke to a crowd gathered for him in Bolotnaya Square in Central Moscow. "We have organized the most honest and the most open election in the history of Moscow," he said.

As David Herszenhorn points out here though, he did not exactly declare victory.

00:21 9.9.2013
23:39 8.9.2013
Explainer: There are two counts going on right now. The official one, from the Central Election Commission, has Navalny at about 25% and Sobyanin at 53%, The other, from The People's Electoral Commission, has Sobyanin right around or just below 50 percent. The former is a tabulation of the official count from Commission members at stations and the latter is done by election observers themselves.
23:19 8.9.2013
On Twitter, Navalny's campaign manager says, "Turnout has not been announced, but a political decision has obviously been made." He ends his Tweet with a common Russian curse-word.
22:53 8.9.2013
From RFE/RL's rundown of the day so far: According to preliminary results, United Russia party gubernatorial candidates are winning in Moscow Oblast, Vladimir Oblast, Khabarovsk Krai, Zabaikalsky Krai, Khakasia, and Magadan Oblast.

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