Moscow Concerned About the Impact of Exiles on the Russian Presidential Elections

Six informed sources have said that Vladimir Putin, the President of Russia, has decided to participate in the presidential elections in March. According to the Poligraf website, a fact-checking project of Voice of America, the 71-year-old Putin, who is accused of war crimes in Ukraine, will face no political rivals in this election due to his 80% public approval rating and will remain in the Kremlin until 2030. However, due to increasing dissatisfaction with Putin's domestic and foreign policies and the potential interference from the large community of Russians in exile, Russian election officials are on high alert. Ella Pamfilova, head of the Central Election Commission of Russia, referred to the exiled Russian opponents in vulgar terms during a conference in Moscow on November 21, emphasizing the Kremlin's concerns ahead of the elections: "Trash that... now makes their pathetic money by disrupting the elections and discrediting them." Earlier, on September 30, Maxim Katz, an opposition blogger with nearly two million subscribers on YouTube, called for a joint campaign to ensure that Putin is not elected as President of Russia, urging all opposition movements in Russia to unite for this goal. On October 21, about 200 representatives from groups, movements, and associations met with influential members of the opposition in exile in Russia. In this meeting, it was decided to ask Russians to join the national campaign "No to Putin." This effort was promoted by Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a long-time rival of Putin, and his allies. He stated, "We believe Vladimir Putin is responsible for dragging the country into a major conflict and a regional war." Dmitry Gudkov, an opposition figure and former Duma member, told a television channel in Ukraine that the main goal of the opposition in exile is to delegitimize the presidential elections next year, and to achieve this goal, they will involve influential politicians, famous writers, popular artists, musicians, and well-known actors. According to Igor Koroptev, head of the Free Russia Foundation office in the South Caucasus, there are multiple online and social media projects against the Russian elections, including the "Legion of A" which is an anti-war and anti-propaganda initiative by a group of Russian refugees aimed at ending the war in Ukraine and countering "brainwashing" by state media and propaganda. Since the launch of this legion about two years ago, the "A" group has written approximately 2.3 million comments on social media and filtered around 900 pro-government online communities. Some Russian exiles have proposed more radical ways to remove Putin. Ilya Ponomarev, a former Duma representative, has supported armed resistance against Russian authorities and has participated in creating the Russian Freedom Legion, a unit in the Ukrainian army composed of Russian citizens opposed to Putin's regime. He also established a shadow parliament called the "Congress of People's Representatives," consisting of former legislators in exile from Russia. The Kremlin has ensured, as in previous elections, the removal of all its political rivals from the March 2024 elections. On April 17, a court in Moscow found Vladimir Kara-Murza, a prominent opposition figure, guilty of treason and sentenced him to 25 years in prison. Alexei Navalny, Putin's most prominent critic, has been in prison since January 2021 and has been sentenced to 19 years for creating an extremist community and inciting extremism. It is believed that about 20 to 30 million Russians live abroad. Russia has experienced its largest wave of emigration since the invasion of Ukraine in March 2022. Various estimates suggest that between 500,000 to 1.3 million people left Russia last year. However, Pamfilova's claim that exiled Russians will attempt to "discredit" the presidential elections domestically is misleading. International observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, and others have documented systematic violations in Russian elections since 2011, including the removal of Kremlin critics, government interference in voting, casting fake ballots, and violations of the vote counting process. On October 13, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe called on European countries to consider Putin's regime illegitimate if he remains in power after the 2024 elections. According to this report, "A very long presidential term, along with the absence of any checks and balances such as a strong parliament, an independent judiciary, free media, and a vibrant civil society, has turned the Russian Federation into a real dictatorship." Reuters, citing six informed sources: Putin wants to remain in power until at least 2030.