Скачать или смотреть RUSSIA: FINAL PREPARATIONS FOR STATE DUMA ELECTIONS (2)

(18 Dec 1999) Russian/Nat

Russia is making final preparations for parliamentary elections to be held on Sunday, when 450 deputies will be elected to the State Duma, the lower house of parliament.

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that Russia is ready for a free and fair vote.

The election will be monitored by 500-thousand Russian observers, and a thousand foreign monitors.

More than 100 (m) million Russians will be asked to cast their votes at 10-thousand polling stations across Russia on Sunday.

With the vast territory stretching from the Baltic Sea to the Bering Strait, and covering 11 time zones, some regions will go to the polls on Saturday.

The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) is sending the largest contingent of foreign election monitors, made up of delegates from more than 20 O-S-C-E member states.

Local election officials are keen to ensure that voting is above board.

SOUNDBITE: (Russian)
"Our goal is to hold these elections in such a way that there will be no complaints from various observers that are going to be present here tomorrow."
SUPER CAPTION: Kirill Ignatov, Local electoral commission chairman

The Federal Security Service and the Federal Guards Service have been put on alert, and the Interior Ministry has set up a special headquarters to guard polling stations and ballots.

The police say they're ready for anything.

SOUNDBITE: (Russian)
"We formed a sort of headquarters to deal with all sorts of emergency situations during the elections. Even if, say, there is a bomb threat aimed at a polling station, we will evacuate the people immediately and move in a bus equipped to serve as a replacement polling station."
SUPER CAPTION: Yevgeny Kruglikov, Russian police officer

The election campaign, which ended on Friday, has come under fire from the Central Election Commission, which monitored candidates' television and radio broadcasts.

The Commission now intends to either warn or prosecute contenders who used their campaigns to foment ethnic and social unrest.

Despite the auspices, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said he was confident the vote itself would run smoothly.

SOUNDBITE: (Russian)
"Nothing is perfect and our electoral process needs to be improved as well. Still, I think the country is ready for elections and I'm reasonably sure that they will be fair, open and free".
SUPER CAPTION: Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister of Russia

He added that the results could shed some light on the expected course of Presidential elections, to be held later.

Preliminary results of the voting throughout Russia are expected to be available on Monday morning .

SOUNDBITE: (Russian)
"The elections for Duma and the Presidential elections differ significantly in substance. Of course in some ways the results of Duma elections will serve as a guideline for the presidential ones, albeit a very approximate one".
SUPER CAPTION: Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister of Russia

Presidential elections will be held when Boris Yeltsin's term of office expires.

Yeltsin's press secretary, Dmitry Yakushkin, said on Saturday that the President was set to leave politics after his term.

Yakushkin disagreed with predictions by some of media analysts that Yeltsin is not a man to give up power.

SOUNDBITE: (Russian)
SUPER CAPTION Dmitriy Yakushkin, Yeltsin's spokesman

Yakushkin said Yeltsin was irritated by the non-constructive nature of the outgoing Duma.

He felt too much time was spent politicking.

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