Russians Head to Polls for an Election That Vladimir Putin is Bound to Win

Voting has begun in Russia’s presidential election, which is all but certain to hand Vladimir Putin another six years in power.

The election takes place against the backdrop of a ruthless crackdown that has crippled independent media and prominent rights groups and given Putin full control of the political system.

The 71-year-old is running for his fifth term virtually unchallenged with his political opponents either in jail or in exile abroad.

The fiercest of them, Alexei Navalny, died in a remote Arctic penal colony last month.

The three other candidates on the ballot are low-profile politicians from token opposition parties that toe the Kremlin’s line.

It also comes as Moscow’s war in Ukraine enters its third year. Russia has the advantage on the battlefield, where it is making small, if slow, gains.

Ukraine, meanwhile, has made Moscow look vulnerable behind the front line: Long-range drone attacks have struck deep inside Russia, while high-tech drones have put its Black Sea fleet on the defensive.

Voters are casting their ballots from Friday through until Sunday at polling stations across the vast country’s 11 time zones, as well as in illegally annexed regions of Ukraine.

Russians also can vote online, the first time the option has been used in a presidential contest; more than 200,000 people in Moscow voted online soon after the polls opened, authorities said.

Observers have little to no expectation that the election will be free and fair.

Beyond the fact that voters have been presented with little choice, the possibilities for independent monitoring are very limited.

Ukraine and the West have also condemned Russia for holding the vote in Ukrainian regions that Moscow’s forces have seized and occupied.

The Kremlin banned two politicians from the ballot who sought to run on an antiwar agenda and attracted genuine – albeit not overwhelming – support.

Russia’s scattered opposition has urged those unhappy with Putin or the war to show up at the polls at noon on Sunday, the final day of voting, in protest.

The strategy was endorsed by Navalny not long before his death.