Russian opposition candidate on track to win regional vote

MOSCOW – Partial results in a regional election in Russia’s Far East show an opposition candidate has beaten the incumbent governor by a wide margin.

The official tally on the Central Election Commission’s website showed on Sunday that incumbent Vyacheslav Shport was trailing 40 per cent behind opposition candidate Sergei Furgal, with 90 per cent of the votes counted.

The tally so far in the Khabarovsk region, which borders China, comes one week after an opposition candidate for governor in the neighbouring Primorye region mounted protests following widespread reports of vote-rigging in favour of the Kremlin candidate. Election authorities ended up cancelling the vote results over the reports and called for a new vote.