A Communist candidate gets approval to run in the Russian presidential election

MOSCOW (AP) — Russia’s national elections commission has registered the Communist Party’s candidate to  compete with President Vladimir Putin in the March election that Putin is all but certain to win. Nikolai Kharitonov joins two other candidates who were approved for the ballot last week. Kharitonov, a member of the lower house of parliament, has opposed some of Putin’s domestic policies but not Russia’s military operation in Ukraine. Although the Communist candidate typically gets the second-highest vote tally, Kharitonov does not present a significant challenge to Putin. As the party’s candidate in the 2004 election, he tallied just 13.8%. Putin has dominated Russian politics since he was first elected to the presidency in 2000.