Voting in presidential elections abroad will be more difficult for Russians than before

The number of polling stations abroad for the March 2024 presidential elections will be significantly reduced compared to previous campaigns. The Central Election Commission (CEC) presented the relevant summarized data on Wednesday at its regular meeting. The main obstacles to the expression of the will of Russians abroad, according to members of the Central Election Commission, are created in unfriendly countries.

Commission member Pavel Andreev reported on the difficult situation surrounding the arrangement of polling stations abroad at a meeting of the Central Election Commission on February 28, who presented his colleagues with a project on holding early voting abroad. “In conditions where diplomatic missions and consular offices of the Russian Federation are limited in their ability to create a significant number of polling stations abroad, holding early voting will help ensure that a larger number of voters can vote,” he explained.

However, the number of places for early voting has also decreased in comparison with previous years due to “unfriendly actions” against Russian diplomatic missions, Mr. Andreev noted: “But there are examples when, precisely due to early voting, voting will be organized where there will not be, Unfortunately, areas have been formed.”

In total, early voting is planned in 45 countries compared to 77 countries in 2018, a member of the Central Election Commission summarized: “Naturally, in most unfriendly countries this form will not be used for security reasons.”

Deputy Chairman of the Central Election Commission Nikolai Bulaev, in turn, emphasized that the Central Election Commission, together with the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “has done a lot” to create conditions for Russians to vote abroad, but it will not be possible to open polling stations everywhere. “There are 113 fewer of them (for the presidential elections in 2018, 400 polling stations were created in 145 countries.— “Kommersant”), – Mr. Bulaev complained. “And not through the fault of Russia, but through the fault of those countries where our diplomatic missions are located.” For example, in Germany only two polling stations will open instead of the usual 15, the deputy chairman of the Central Election Commission gave an example.

Mr. Bulaev is confident that both the Central Election Commission and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs must “openly” report “how many times we applied, what answers we received, and why citizens, when they come, will not find the usual polling station, and where they do, there will definitely be queues.” “Not everyone will have the opportunity to vote, and this is not Russia’s fault,” emphasized the deputy chairman of the Central Election Commission. In his opinion, people “must know by name who, where and when made such decisions,” otherwise “in the end they will say: the Central Election Commission and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not organize” the procedure. “Citizens living abroad must understand: they were deprived of the right to express their position,” concluded Nikolai Bulaev. “What it is is another question, but they were deprived of this right, and the countries in which they are located today were deprived.”

The described difficulties arose in countries unfriendly to Russia, confirmed the chairman of the Central Election Commission, Ella Pamfilova: “They arose due to the fact that the number of diplomatic missions, staff of missions, embassies and consulates has sharply decreased.”

Also among the reasons, she said, are “a huge number of unprecedented sanctions that have made logistics and movement difficult,” as well as the “seizure” of consular property and transport. “In order not to shift from a sore head to a healthy one, this must be constantly shown with facts,” Ms. Pamfilova is confident. “It must be shown in which country they responded, promised at least minimal security, in which they ignored it altogether, and in which they are already threatening terrible punishments to all election organizers and by not recognizing their results at all.” At the same time, the head of the Central Election Commission emphasized that in countries “that have not designated us as an enemy and are not considered unfriendly,” despite some difficulties “associated with sanctions,” the executive authorities are meeting the Russian Federation halfway and “all the necessary conditions are being created.”

Grigory Leiba