Press Release, 27.08.2026

Photo: Yabloko candidates Anatoly Golov, Olga Pokrovskaya and Grigory Grishin before submitting documents to the electoral commission / Photo by the Yabloko Press Service

The Leningrad Region Court has upheld the regional Electoral Commission’s refusal to register Yabloko’s list of candidates for the Legislative Assembly elections. It should be noted that the claim filed by Yabloko’s Leningrad Region branch sought to overturn the Commission’s decision on four grounds. The main one concerns a fabrication created by the Electoral Commission: the Commission claimed that Yabloko’s delegates at the party’s Congress on 27 June had not voted at all for the nomination of the candidate list for the Leningrad Region, which does not correspond to the facts.

Anatoly Golov, Chair of Yabloko’s Leningrad Region branch, points out that he personally voted for the nomination of the region’s candidate list at Yabloko’s Congress, as he was a delegate. The Electoral Commission then claimed, he further points out, that the ballot used for voting by Congress delegates did not comply with the law. However, at the hearing on 26 August, where Yabloko’s claim was considered, the Commission’s representative was unable to explain which provision of the law he had in mind, since the law does not, in fact, impose any requirements on the form of the ballot.

During the proceedings, it also emerged that the candidate lists held by Yabloko and by the Electoral Commission differ. The Commission’s representative was unable to explain why the candidates in the Commission’s list appeared in a different order from the list Yabloko had submitted earlier (the one voted on by the party’s Congress).

“This suggests either a serious error on the Commission’s part or falsification, and the party’s lawyers will look into it,” the regional branch stressed.

The ruling dismissing the claim will shortly be appealed to the Second Court of Appeal of General Jurisdiction.

It should be noted that Yabloko’s candidate lists for regional Legislative Assemblies have been registered in the Kaliningrad, Novgorod, Sverdlovsk and Tomsk Regions. In Karelia, the party’s list was removed by the court after registration, on a claim brought by the Rodina party; that ruling has been appealed. A similar claim is being heard today, 27 August, by a court in the Pskov Region. Yabloko’s list in St. Petersburg never reached registration, and the party is challenging the unlawful refusal to admit it to the elections in court.

On 26 August, it was reported that two further claims had been filed against Yabloko’s lists: in the Sverdlovsk Region by the local branch of the LDPR party, and in the Kaliningrad Region by the Communists of Russia party. The claims are identical, indicating a coordinated campaign to prevent Yabloko from participating in the elections.