Moscow: Preliminary results show the ruling United Russia party won 57.83 per cent of the votes in the election for the 9th State Duma, the lower house of parliament, Russian Central Election Commission Chairperson Ella Pamfilova told a press conference Monday.
According to CEC data, after 95.18 per cent of the ballots were counted, United Russia led with 57.83 per cent of the vote, followed by the Communist Party of the Russian Federation with 13.81 per cent and the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia with 8.98 per cent. New People and A Just Russia garnered 7.96 per cent and 4.96 per cent of the vote, respectively.
According to the CEC, turnout in this election, held from Friday to Sunday, was 59.32 per cent, higher than the 51.72 per cent in 2021, Xinhua News Agency reported.
The State Duma is Russia’s permanent legislative body, composed of 450 deputies. Half of the seats are distributed proportionally in accordance with party lists, while the remaining 225 are elected through single-mandate constituencies nationwide under a relative-majority voting system. A total of 10 political parties participated in the election.
The final results are expected to be announced on Friday, said Pamfilova.
On Sunday, Pamfilova said that Russia has fended off more than 100 million potential cyber threats targeting its electoral infrastructure during the State Duma elections.
Russian electoral platforms, including the official election website, endured large-scale high-capacity DDoS attacks and targeted web server intrusions throughout the voting period, Pamfilova said.
Authorities also detected attempts to exploit system vulnerabilities and disrupt national telecommunication infrastructure. All malicious activities were identified and filtered by national security systems, with zero successful cyber breaches recorded despite the unprecedented intensity of attacks.
Investigations confirmed that cyber assaults targeting Russia’s remote electronic voting system mainly originated from overseas, with some attacks using spoofed Russian IP addresses.
Pamfilova slammed Western attempts to disrupt Russia’s electoral process, noting that Western countries have mobilised professional lawyers as “electoral vultures” to seek legal loopholes, spread disinformation and disrupt the CEC’s work.
She criticised Western leaders and institutions for groundlessly smearing Russia’s elections, pointing out that these Western politicians lack genuine public support at home yet arbitrarily judge Russia’s legitimate electoral affairs.
(IANS)
