On Saturday, the Russian Central Election Commission (CEC) voted unanimously to prevent anti-war candidate Yekaterina Duntsova from running against Vladimir Putin in the country's upcoming presidential election.
According to Fox News, the commission cited "numerous violations" in the nomination paperwork she submitted.
In a statement on Telegram, Duntsova vowed to challenge the ruling before the country's Supreme Court. "With this political decision, we are deprived of the opportunity to have our own representative and express views that differ from the official aggressive discourse," she said.
At the same time, she reached out to leaders of the Yabloko political party asking to be their presidential nominee as they have not put forth a nominee. The party's leader Grigory Yavlinsky put out a statement saying they would not back Duntsova "because we don't know her," and that they were not planning on fielding a candidate in this election.
In a statement, the head of the CEC, Ella Pamfilova said to Dunsova, "You are a young woman, you have everything ahead of you. Any minus can always be turned into a plus. Any experience is still an experience."
Critics of the CDC said that the decision shows that the election will be a fake process as any serious contender to Putin would not be allowed to run. The Kremlin says that Putin holds the support of 80 percent of the people and will win regardless.
In an interview with Reuters in November, Duntsova called for the release of political prisoners and noted that Russians are "very tired" of the Ukraine conflict. She said of her candidacy, "Any sane person taking this step would be afraid, but fear must not win."
Around the same time, The Civic Initiative party, which Reuters describes as "centre-right," announced Saturday that it would be putting forward Boris Nadezhdin as its candidate against Putin, and said he plans to file his documents on Dec. 25.
