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18-03-2024
MOSCOW: Vladimir Putin reelection in Russia’s presidential election, extending his rule by six years, has gathered strong reactions from global leaders, media reported.
The VTsIOM poll run by the Russian authority announced Putin’s victory just as the time closed in the country’s westernmost area of Kaliningrad at 17:00 GMT.
An official from the White House National Security Council questioned the election process, who said: “The elections are obviously not free nor fair given how Mr. Putin has imprisoned political opponents and prevented others from running against him.”
In line with the German Foreign Ministry which denounced the election saying: “The pseudo-election in Russia is neither free nor fair, the result will surprise nobody. Putin’s rule is authoritarian, he relies on censorship, repression & violence. The “election” in the occupied territories of Ukraine are null and void & another breach of international law.”
While the British Foreign Office voiced apprehension over Russia’s plan to hold elections in Ukraine, they made it clear that the action goes against the peacemaking process.
The UK restated the obligation to stand with Ukraine through supplies of humanitarian, economic and military aid for the sake of preserving democracy.
President Vladimir Putin won a record post-Soviet landslide in Russia’s election on Sunday, cementing his already tight grip on power in a victory he said showed Moscow had been right to stand up to the West and send its troops into Ukraine.
Putin, a former KGB lieutenant colonel who first rose to power in 1999, made it clear that the result should send a message to the West that its leaders will have to reckon with an emboldened Russia, whether in war or in peace, for many more years to come.
The outcome means Putin, 71, is set to embark on a new six-year term that will see him overtake Josef Stalin and become Russia’s longest-serving leader for more than 200 years if he completes it.
Putin won 87.8% of the vote, the highest ever result in Russia’s post-Soviet history, according to an exit poll by pollster the Public Opinion Foundation (FOM). The Russian Public Opinion Research Centre (VCIOM) put Putin on 87%. First official results indicated the polls were accurate. The United States, Germany, the United Kingdom and other nations have said the vote was neither free nor fair due to the imprisonment of political opponents and censorship.
Communist candidate Nikolai Kharitonov finished second with just under 4%, newcomer Vladislav Davankov third, and ultra-nationalist Leonid Slutsky fourth, partial results suggested.
Putin told supporters in a victory speech in Moscow that he would prioritize resolving tasks associated with what he called Russia’s “special military operation” in Ukraine and would strengthen the Russian military.
“We have many tasks ahead. But when we are consolidated – no matter who wants to intimidate us, suppress us – nobody has ever succeeded in history, they have not succeeded now, and they will not succeed ever in the future,” said Putin. (Int’l Monitoring Desk)
