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International Herald Tribune
Putin calls victory 'sign of trust' in government
By Clifford J. Levy
Tuesday, December 4, 2007

MOSCOW: President Vladimir Putin declared that his party's imposing victory in parliamentary elections was a "sign of trust" that had conferred new legitimacy on the government.

But European monitors and opposition parties harshly criticized the balloting, saying it had been neither free nor fair.

The final tally from the vote on Sunday showed that Putin's party, United Russia, had received 64.1 percent, giving it roughly 315 seats in the 450-seat Duma, or lower house of Parliament, which would be enough votes to amend the Constitution. Far behind was the Communist Party, with 11.6 percent, or 57 seats. Two other parties allied with Putin - the Liberal Democrats and Just Russia - are also to receive seats.

Putin, who repeatedly used the Kremlin's authority to assist United Russia, said the election signified that the nation was maturing as a democracy. He noted that the four parties that were to enter Parliament received 90 percent of the vote.

"Russians will never allow for the development of the country along a destructive path, the way it happened in some countries in the post-Soviet space," Putin said. "And this sense of responsibility of citizens for their own country is, in my view, the most important index of the fact that our country is strengthening not only economically, not only socially, but also in terms of its domestic politics."

The end of the parliamentary campaign is expected to intensify discussion in Russia about who will be the next president. United Russia is holding a meeting in two weeks at which Putin might designate a candidate to run in the presidential election in March.

Whoever he names will be the presumptive front-runner.

Putin cannot run again because of constitutional term limits, though United Russia's strong performance on Sunday renewed speculation that he might ask Parliament to amend the Constitution.

If he does not, what he will do after March remains a mystery. He has said he wants to continue wielding influence over the nation, but how he would do that - and what his relationship would be with the next president - was unclear.

Even as Putin was hailing the election, European monitors were taking a different view, contending that there had been "a clear abuse of power and a clear violation of international commitments and standards."

Balloting, the monitors said in a statement, "took place in an atmosphere which seriously limited political competition and with frequent abuse of administrative resources, media coverage strongly in favor of the ruling party, and an election code whose cumulative effect hindered political pluralism."

Luc van den Brande of Belgium, leader of the mission from the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe, said Putin had improperly used the Kremlin to help United Russia. "There are a lot of concerns about the evolution of democracy in the country," van den Brande said.

Last month, the most prominent international group of election monitors - experts who work for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe - abandoned plans to observe the vote, citing Russian restrictions that made their work impossible. Parliamentarians affiliated with the organization, as well as others from the Council of Europe, decided to come on a separate mission.

A member of Russia's Central Election Commission, Igor Borisov, dismissed the monitors' conclusions. He told Interfax news agency: "It's a political order. Political expediency dictated from overseas prevailed over the principles of monitoring."

Still, there was no shortage of detractors inside Russia.

The head of the Communist Party, Gennadi Zyuganov, said, "The elections were so dirty, and the numerous violations were so outrageous, that only a blind or deaf person could not have seen or heard them."

With the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party clearing the 7 percent threshold to enter Parliament, one of its new leaders, Andrei Lugovoi, is expected to receive a seat.

Lugovoi is the former KGB officer accused in Britain in the fatal radiation poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko. Britain has sought Lugovoi's extradition, but Russia has refused. Once he enters Parliament, Lugovoi will have immunity from prosecution in Russia.

Among the most startling results from the election Sunday were those in the war-torn republic of Chechnya, which is run by a strongman installed by Putin.

United Russia won 99.4 percent of the vote in Chechnya, officials said, with a turnout of 99.5 percent.

Overall in Russia, the turnout was about 63 percent.

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