A woman registers to vote in Russia’s presidential election in the city of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk on far eastern Sakhalin Island on March 17, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AFP

Kremlin critics called for massive protests at Russian polling stations on Sunday for the final day of a presidential election that is guaranteed to cement Vladimir Putin’s hardline rule.

The three-day vote has already been marred by a surge in fatal Ukrainian bombardments and a series of incursions into Russian territory by pro-Ukrainian sabotage groups.

There have also been acts of protest in the first days of polling, with a spate of arrests of Russians accused of pouring dye into ballot boxes or arson attacks.

Before his death in an Arctic prison last month, opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who galvanised mass anti-Putin rallies, urged Russians to protest on Sunday.

His widow, Yulia Navalnaya, has reiterated his call in the run-up to the election and said protesters should show up in large numbers at the same time to overwhelm polling stations.

She called for protestors to spoil ballots by writing “Navalny” on them, or vote for candidates other than Putin.

Any public dissent in Russia has been harshly punished since the start of Moscow’s offensive in Ukraine on February 24, 2022 and there have been repeated warnings from the authorities against election protests.

Russian opposition has called on people to head to the polls at 12 p.m. (0900 GMT), in what they hope will be a legal a show of strength against Putin.

A Moscow resident in his twenties told AFP he would take part in the protest at noon in the capital, “just to see young supportive faces around… feel some support around me, and see the light in this dark tunnel.”

The man, who declined to give his name for security reasons, said he hoped the demonstration would show the authorities “that there are people in this country against the conflict… against the regime.”

‘Difficult period’

The 71-year-old Putin, a former KGB agent, has been in power since the last day of 1999 and is set to extend his grip over the country until at least 2030.

If he completes another Kremlin term, he would have stayed in power longer than any Russian leader since Catherine the Great in the 18th century.

He is running without any real opponents, having barred two candidates who opposed the conflict in Ukraine.

The Kremlin has cast the election as an opportunity for Russians to show they are behind the assault on Ukraine, where voting is also being staged in Russian-held areas.

In a pre-election address on Thursday, Putin said Russia was going through a “difficult period”.

“We need to continue to be united and self-confident,” he said, describing the election as a way for Russians to demonstrate their “patriotic feelings”.

The voting will wrap up in Kaliningrad, Russia’s westernmost time zone, at 1800 GMT and an exit poll is expected to be announced shortly after that.

A concert on Red Square is being staged on Monday to mark 10 years since Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula – an event that is also expected to serve as a victory celebration for Putin.

‘No validity’

Ukraine has repeatedly denounced the elections as illegitimate and a “farce”, and its foreign ministry has urged Western allies not to recognise the result.

U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, as well as more than 50 member states, have slammed Moscow for holding the vote in parts of Ukraine, with Guterres saying that the “attempted illegal annexation” of those regions has “no validity” under international law.

Ahead of the election, Russian state media have played up recent gains on the front and portrayed the conflict as a fight for survival against attacks from the West.

Moscow has sought to press its advantage on the front line as divisions over Western military support for Ukraine have led to ammunition shortages, although Kyiv says it has managed to stop the Russian advance for now.

In Ukraine, a Russian missile strike on the Black Sea port city of Odesa on Friday killed 21 people including rescue workers responding to an initial hit — an attack President Volodymyr Zelensky described as “vile”.

On the Russian side, the army has reported repeated attempts by Ukrainian sabotage groups to cross into Russia and the local governor in Belgorod region on Saturday decreed that shopping malls and schools would be shut for two days in the main city Belgorod and the surrounding district following recent strikes.

Russian President Vladimir Putin attends an electronic voting during a presidential voting at the Novo-Ogaryovo state residence outside Moscow, Russia, on March 15, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Russia began three days of voting on Friday in a presidential election that is all but certain to extend President Vladimir Putin’s rule by six more years after he stifled dissent.

At least half a dozen cases of vandalism at polling stations were reported, including a firebombing.

The election takes place against the backdrop of a ruthless crackdown that has crippled independent media and prominent rights groups and given Mr. Putin full control of the political system.

It also comes as Moscow’s war in Ukraine enters its third year. Russia has the advantage on the battlefield, where it is making small, if slow, gains.

Ukraine, meanwhile, has made Moscow look vulnerable behind the front line.

Russian regions bordering Ukraine have reported several attempts by Ukrainian fighters to take towns this week. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday that “it is beyond any doubt that they are related one way or another to attempts to cast a shadow on the elections.”

Voters are casting their ballots on Friday through Sunday at polling stations across the vast country’s 11 time zones, in illegally annexed regions of Ukraine and online.

Also read | Alexei Navalny, who galvanised opposition to Putin, is laid to rest after his death in prison

Officials said that voting was proceeding in an orderly fashion. But in St. Petersburg, a woman threw a Molotov cocktail onto the roof of a school that houses a polling station, local news media reported. The deputy head of the Russian Central Election Commission said people poured green liquid into ballot boxes in five places, including in Moscow.

The election holds little suspense since Mr. Putin, 71, is running for his fifth term virtually unchallenged. His political opponents are either in jail or in exile; the fiercest of them, Alexei Navalny, died in an Arctic penal colony last month. The three other candidates on the ballot are low-profile politicians from token opposition parties that toe the Kremlin’s line.

No Opposition, choice

Observers have little to no expectation that the election will be free and fair.

European Council President Charles Michel mordantly commented on Friday on the vote’s preordained nature. “Would like to congratulate Vladimir Putin on his landslide victory in the elections starting today. No opposition. No freedom. No choice,” he wrote on X.

Beyond the fact that voters have been presented with few options, the possibilities for independent monitoring are very limited. No significant international observer missions were present.

The Organization for Security and Cooperation Europe’s monitors were not invited, and only registered candidates or state-backed advisory bodies can assign observers to polling stations, decreasing the likelihood of independent watchdogs. With balloting over three days in nearly 1,00,000 polling stations in the country, any true oversight is difficult anyway.

“The current elections will not be able to reflect the real mood of the people,” Golos, Russia’s renowned independent election observer group, said in the report.

“The distance between citizens and decision-making about the fate of the country has become greater than ever.”