Kremlin critics to contest online voting in Duma election

By DARIA LITVINOVA
Associated Press

MOSCOW (AP) — A group of politicians and activists who lost to their Kremlin-backed opponents in Russia’s parliamentary election have formed a coalition to contest the results from online voting in the Russian capital. The candidates believe the online voting results were rigged in a way that caused them to lose. Opposition candidates were largely excluded from the ballot, but one of the few Kremlin critics allowed to run for seats in the State Duma announced the decision to challenge the online election returns. The opposition has pointed to a number of individual Moscow races as evidence of tampering. In those races, Kremlin-backed candidates were losing until the results of online voting came in Monday.