Britain’s foreign minister,David Cameron, criticized the outcome of Russian elections, labeling it as indicative of “the depth of repression” under President Vladimir Putin. Despite the Kremlin’s praise for Putin’s landslide re-election, Cameron reiterated his stance that the election lacked fairness and freedom, dismissing the result as undemocratic.
“These Russian election starkly underline the depth of repression under President Putin’s regime, which seeks to silence any opposition to his illegal war (in Ukraine),” he said.
“Putin removes his political opponents, controls the media, and then crowns himself the winner. This is not democracy,” he added.
The Kremlin has portrayed the recent weekend election, which saw ballot irregularities and Ukrainian attacks on border areas, as validation of Russian support for Putin’s actions regarding Ukraine. Cameron highlighted the death of Putin’s prominent political opponent, Alexei Navalny, as further evidence of Putin’s oppressive regime.
“The death of Alexei Navalny just weeks before the election was a tragic reminder of the severity of political repression in Russia today.” Russia should “immediately release all political prisoners”, including British-Russian dual-national Vladimir Kara-Murza, he added
At 42 years old, opposition figure Kara-Murza received the harshest sentence to date- 25 years imprisonment- for his vocal opposition to the Ukraine conflict. He faced charges of “treason” following remarks made in the United States where he accused Russai of committing “war crimes’ against Ukraine. Kara-Murza’s lawyers attribute his deteriorating health to two alleged poising incidents orchestrated by Russia’s FSB security service in 2015 and 2017