{"id":465475,"date":"2026-09-18T17:11:08","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T15:11:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/2026\/09\/18\/al-via-le-elezioni-parlamentari-in-russia-il-consiglio-deuropa-una-farsa\/"},"modified":"2026-09-18T17:34:39","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T15:34:39","slug":"parliamentary-elections-get-underway-in-russia-the-council-of-europe-a-farce","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/2026\/09\/18\/parliamentary-elections-get-underway-in-russia-the-council-of-europe-a-farce\/","title":{"rendered":"Parliamentary elections get underway in Russia. The Council of Europe: \u201cA farce\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brussels \u2013 The elections for the Russian Parliament (Duma), which begin today (18 September), \u201cdo not meet international democratic standards\u201d and their result \u201ccannot be regarded as a genuine expression of the will of the Russian people.\u201d This is the position expressed by the Platform<\/a><\/span> for dialogue with the Russian Democratic Forces of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE)<\/a>, according to which the election of the 450 members of parliament will result in an assembly that cannot be recognised as democratically elected<\/strong> nor as a legitimate representative of the Russian people. <\/p>\n

At the heart of the criticism is, first and foremost, the conduct of the vote in the Ukrainian territories temporarily occupied by Russia. According to PACE, organising the vote in these areas constitutes \u201ca violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity\u201d <\/strong>of Ukraine and of international law, rendering the vote devoid of legitimacy or legal effect. The vote therefore also extends to Crimea, which was annexed in 2014, and to the Ukrainian provinces of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson, which were militarily occupied and annexed in 2022. <\/p>\n

PACE also condemns the domestic political context<\/strong> in which the elections are taking place. \u201cOpposition figures, civil society representatives, and journalists have been imprisoned, persecuted, or forced into exile\u201d, while several independent media outlets \u201chave been shut down or blocked.\u201d Even peaceful criticism of the Russian war against Ukraine has been criminalised. <\/p>\n

The assembly also criticised the use of labels such as “foreign agent”, “extremist”, “terrorist”, and “undesirable organisation”, which are regarded as legal tools used to target individuals and organisations critical of the authorities. According to PACE, alongside judicial proceedings deemed to be politically motivated, \u201cthese measures have reduced the space for political debate and for genuine electoral competition.<\/strong>\u201d <\/p>\n

A further cause for concern is the exclusion of the Yabloko<\/a> party, the country\u2019s oldest liberal and pro-Western party<\/strong>. According to the statement, its exclusion would have deprived Russian voters of \u201can opportunity, albeit a limited one, to express their dissent regarding the war in Ukraine-\u201d The party was known for attracting the attention of voters dissatisfied with the war. It was therefore excluded after just five days of campaigning on flimsy grounds, linked to an alleged copyright infringement. <\/p>\n

Finally, Russia did not invite the OSCE<\/a> or independent representatives of civil society to observe the elections<\/strong>, thereby preventing an \u201cindependent and impartial international assessment\u201d of the electoral process. Furthermore, doubts remain regarding the transparency of electronic voting, which is managed via technological infrastructure under state control. <\/p>\n

According to PACE, an election held under these conditions is \u201cincompatible with the international commitments undertaken by Russia,<\/strong>\u201d which require genuine political competition, freedom to campaign, access to a range of political views and the ability to vote without fear of reprisals. It\u2019s the same old story; history continues to repeat itself unabated. The recent Russian presidential elections, held in March 2024, took place in an \u201cextremely restrictive context, further exacerbated by Russia\u2019s illegal war of aggression against Ukraine,\u201d the then EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Josep Borrell<\/strong>, had commented<\/a> on behalf of the European Union: \u201cThe Russian authorities have continued to step up systematic internal repression<\/strong>, cracking down on opposition politicians, civil society organisations, independent media and other critical voices through the use of repressive legislation and politically motivated prison sentences.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

At the heart of the criticism is, first and foremost, the conduct of the voting in the Ukrainian territories temporarily occupied by Russia: voting is also taking place in Crimea and in the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7896,"featured_media":278603,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","podmotor_file_id":"","podmotor_episode_id":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","filesize_raw":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"format":"standard","override":[{"template":"1","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","post_calculate_word_method":"str_word_count","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","show_comment_section":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"0","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","disable_ad":"0","subtitle":""},"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_override_counter":{"view_counter_number":"0","share_counter_number":"0","like_counter_number":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[25707],"tags":[28201,34785,35776,34786,26319,34788,31897,26109,35777,25803,30781,27127],"class_list":["post-465475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-politics","tag-crimea-in-2","tag-donetsk","tag-duma","tag-kherson","tag-kiev-en-2","tag-luhansk","tag-mosca-en-2","tag-osce-en","tag-parlamento-russo","tag-russia-in-2","tag-ukraine-in-2","tag-zaporizhzhia-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465475","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7896"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465475"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465475\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":465476,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465475\/revisions\/465476"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/278603"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465475"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465475"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.eunews.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465475"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}