Press release, August 14, 2013

Courts removed YABLOKO’s candidates for the posts of city heads in three cities: Vladivostok, Tuapse and Klimovsk. The law suits were initiated by YABLOKO’s competitors from spoiler parties.

Yesterday the court withdrew YABLOKO’s Yugeny Vitishko, renowned ecologist and a personal enemy of Krasnodar Governor Alexander Tkachyov, from the election of the Tuapse city head . Application for removal of Vitishko from the election was filed by Oleg Khaldarov, candidate from the Communists of Russia party. Khaldarov stated that Vitishko had allegedly provided to the Election Commission inaccurate information about his present place of work (as in spite of the fact that Vitishko had been working at the Chernomor UBPR company since its foundation, the Electoral Commission obtained a letter from the company allegedly after pressing the director that Vitishko had not worked in the company). According to Vitishko, it was not that first time that Communists of Russia were using such a trick for ousting their competitors.

In Vladivostok, Alexander Yurtaev from the Just Russia party withdrew his rival for the post of the city mayor Nikolai Markovtsev, leader the Maritime branch of YABLOKO, from the election. The court took a decision against Markovtsev basing on outdated data on who was the leader of YABLOKO’s regional branch.

On August 1, Klimovsk City Court annulled the decision on registration of YABLOKO’s candidate – Alexnder Gunko, leader of the Moscow Region YABLOKO – for the head of Klimovsk, Moscow region. Pavel Laptev, Gunko’s competitor from the Right Cause party challenged the registration stating, for example, that Gunko’s documents submitted for registration “were not in order” as, for exmaple, a copy of his passport cover was missing (despite the fact that all the passport pages with personal data were accurately copied and submitted to the Electoral Commission).

Alexander Gunko assessed this as a purposeful struggle against the opposition, and said that he would continue his work in the campaign. “I will support and assist in the election campaign to other opposition parties in this election, the most important thing for us is the victory over the ruling party,” he said.