The elections that weren't
Incumbent candidates report sweeping victories in Russia’s regional elections
Hello from the Bear Market Brief.
This week in the news:
Incumbent candidates reported sweeping victories in Russia’s regional and municipal elections amid widespread political repression.
Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov spoke out about his arrest in France, calling the investigation against him “misguided.”
A new documentary by the Anti-Corruption Foundation accused businessman Leonid Nevzlin of ordering the attack on Leonid Volkov earlier this year.
The fourth Crimea Platform Summit took place in Kyiv, with numerous international representatives voicing support for Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Western allies are encouraging Ukraine to set more realistic goals for its war with Russia.
— Sara Ashbaugh, Editor in Chief
The elections that weren’t
Russia held regional and municipal elections, as well as three by-elections to the State Duma, on September 6-8. As expected, the official results confirmed pro-Kremlin incumbents in all gubernatorial races and strengthened the position of the governing United Russia party in all regional legislatures where votes were held. All of this happened under extremely repressive conditions, with a high number of reports of rigging and falsifications across the country and a record low number of candidates standing for office. The independent election observer organization Golos attributed this to political repression and potential candidates losing their appetite to run under the current circumstances.
In the Khabarovsk Territory, where the arrest of then-governor Sergey Furgal prompted massive protests in 2020, Kremlin candidate Dmitry Demeshin (a former prosecutor who had set out to rein in local elites) gathered more than 81% of the vote according to the official tally, becoming the only governor of the 21 regional leaders standing for election who dared to report a vote share higher than what was reported for Vladimir Putin in this year’s March presidential election in the same region. Otherwise, no region reported more support for the incumbent governor than Putin’s overall national vote tally of 87%. In Moscow, where, five years ago, opposition candidates aided by Alexei Navalny’s “Smart Voting” platform won 20 of 45 seats in the City Council, United Russia now won 38 with total electronic voting (a significantly less transparent system than paper ballots) and the intimidation of remaining opposition activists.
Many of the other high tallies are also wholly unrealistic and were likely falsified. Sitting governors reported significant support even in regions such as Bashkortostan, where some of the largest protests of the past year took place. Although activists in Bashkortostan have protested against the authorities and Governor Radiy Khabirov, Khabirov officially got over 80% of the vote (amidst widespread anomalies and claims by a local analyst that his actual result was closer to 40%). Incumbent governors also reported robust support in Orenburg, which saw devastating and mismanaged floods earlier this year; St. Petersburg, where Governor Alexander Beglov is widely considered incompetent and unpopular; and Kursk, which is partially under Ukrainian occupation, and where nonetheless local electoral authorities reported a significantly higher turnout than in the region’s last gubernatorial election (according to researcher Ivan Shukshin, up to 60% of the votes for incumbent governor Alexey Smirnov could have been falsified).
In the Irkutsk Region city of Bratsk, an important industrial hub, the incumbent United Russia mayor Sergey Serebrennikov suffered a resounding defeat. This was due to a split in the regional United Russia chapter, which allowed Alexander Dubrovin, the head of the Bratsk District, to run against Serebrennikov and win—after a local activist, the Communist Party’s candidate, had been disqualified. Opposition candidates and activists only managed to receive a handful of mandates in some city assemblies, but typically at extremely low levels of turnout. While it seems that at the level of municipalities, remnants of political pluralism are still present, over the past years the Kremlin has systematically pushed political competition back to ever lower levels, and last week’s votes constitute yet another step in this direction. These elections also seem to signal a further step towards “systemic” opposition parties becoming insignificant as they are forced to share an ever smaller number of positions and electorate and are discouraged from cooperating with local activists.
— Andras Toth-Czifra
On September 10, Ukraine launched one of its largest drone attacks in Russia since the beginning of the war. The Russian Ministry of Defense reported destroying 144 Ukrainian drones overnight, including several in the Moscow Region. In the town of Ramenskoye, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from Moscow, a 17-story apartment building was hit and set ablaze. According to Moscow Governor Andrei Vorobyov, a 46-year-old woman was killed, three people were hospitalized, and 43 residents were transferred to temporary accommodation. Drone attacks were also reported in the Bryansk, Tula, Kursk, Kaluga, Voronezh, Lipetsk, and Oryol oblasts. (photo: Maxim Shemetov / Reuters / Scanpix / LETA)
Telegram CEO under investigation in France
Pavel Durov, founder and CEO of the popular social media app Telegram, was arrested in France in late August. The 39-year-old billionaire was detained at the Le Bourget airport outside Paris on Saturday, August 24 and questioned for several days by French authorities. As an administrator of Telegram, he is accused of being complicit in illegal activity on the platform, including drug trafficking, organized crime, and the distribution of sexual images of children. According to Politico, the case against Durov began when Telegram refused to comply with a French inquiry into child sexual abuse on the app.
After four days of questioning, Durov was granted conditional release on a bail of 5 million euros ($5.5 million). He remains under formal investigation, so he is required to regularly report to French police and is prohibited from leaving France. Shortly following his arrest, an official statement by Telegram called the accusations “absurd.” “Telegram complies in all respects with European rules concerning digital technology,” Durov’s lawyer, David-Olivier Kaminski, said. On September 5, Durov finally broke his silence and posted about his arrest, calling it “misguided.” While he admitted that Telegram is “not perfect,” Durov also said that millions of harmful posts are removed from the platform every day. “If a country is unhappy with an internet service, the established practice is to start a legal action against the service itself,” he wrote, continuing, “No innovator will ever build new tools if they know they can be personally held responsible for potential abuse of those tools.” If convicted, Durov may face up to 10 years in prison.
Durov was born in Russia and holds Russian citizenship, but he now resides primarily in Dubai, where Telegram’s headquarters are located. In addition to being a Russian citizen, Durov is also a citizen of France and the United Arab Emirates (as well as Saint Kitts and Nevis). He has visited Russia frequently since he founded Telegram a decade ago: more than 50 times according to media outlet iStories. Telegram now boasts more than 950 million users globally and has played a key role in disseminating information related to the war in Ukraine. Politicians, bloggers, and correspondents on both sides of the war frequently use the app, and it is reportedly a main communication tool for the Russian military on the frontlines.
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov commented on Durov’s arrest at a press conference last week; “The accusations are very serious indeed, and they require an equally serious basis of evidence,” he said. President Putin also spoke about Durov during the Eastern Economic Forum. “I know that many countries have complained about Telegram, considering that the platform is used by people and structures that can damage the economy and state security,” he said, “But all platforms of this kind are guilty of this. If they do this to Durov, then others should also be shut down and arrested.”
— Sara Ashbaugh
Nevzlin vs. FBK
The Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK), an organization founded by the late Alexei Navalny, released a documentary and related investigative material accusing Leonid Nevzlin, a Russian-Israeli businessman, of ordering the attack on Leonid Volkov that took place in Lithuania in March of this year. The Lithuanian authorities then claimed that they suspected Russian special agents of involvement in the attack. Volkov is a former head of FBK, and, according to the film, Nevzlin also orchestrated attacks on other public figures with links to Navalny, such as economist Maxim Mironov, Mironov’s wife, and Ivan Zhdanov, another former head of FBK.
The accusations led to shock and uproar in the already often quarrelsome Russian emigrant opposition. Nevzlin is the former business partner (through the Yukos oil company) of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, an exiled businessman who spent ten years in prison before emigrating. Nevzlin, Khodorkovsky, and FBK have a history of conflict; both businessmen have criticized FBK’s political initiatives. In the new documentary, Marina Pevchikh, a close associate of Navalny, speaks about prior threats from Nevzlin. FBK’s researchers claim that they obtained evidence of Nevzlin’s involvement from the businessman’s middleman Andrei Matus—who also claimed to have worked for three years for both Nevzlin and Khodorkovsky—in Montenegro, however, this evidence has not been corroborated by others (so far). Nevzlin himself denies involvement, and Khodorkovsky suggested that the case could be an FSB operation, likely intended to sow discord between various opposition groups in exile.
Regardless of the veracity of the claims, it is almost certain that this is happening at a time when various exiled opposition groups already have grave disagreements about how to approach the war in Ukraine and what kind of post-Putin Russia they would like to see.
— Andras Toth-Czifra
A Beluga whale that was rumored to have been a Russian spy was found dead off the coast of Norway last week. Norwegian authorities first became aware of the whale in 2019, when he was discovered wearing a camera harness with the words “Equipment St. Petersburg” on it. Officials speculated that the whale may have escaped from the Russian navy, but Moscow never confirmed or denied the rumors. Nicknamed “Hvaldimir” by Norwegians, the whale has been monitored by marine biologists ever since. Hvaldimir’s body was found on September 1. Although there were initially reports that he had been shot, a police investigation concluded that there was no human activity involved in his death. (photo: Oleg Moroz / Unsplash)
The Crimea Platform Summit in Kyiv: Highlights
On Wednesday, Kyiv hosted the fourth Crimea Platform Summit. Established in 2021, the Crimea Platform is an international forum designed to enhance global responses to the ongoing occupation of Crimea, address escalating security threats, increase international pressure on the Kremlin, prevent further human rights violations, protect victims of the occupation regime, and ultimately achieve the de-occupation of Crimea and its peaceful return to Ukraine.
This year’s summit saw participation from over 60 representatives, including presidents, prime ministers, and other high-level officials. Notably, Latvia and Croatia announced new military aid packages and financial support for Ukraine’s energy sector. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken highlighted Ukraine’s achievements in targeting and destroying Russian military assets in Crimea and reopening maritime routes for grain transport. In his video address, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan emphasized that the security and well-being of the Crimean Tatars are a top priority for Turkey’s foreign policy. He expressed Turkey’s desire for a just and lasting peace based on Ukraine’s territorial integrity and independence. Representatives from the UK, Japan, Lithuania, and Canada also voiced strong support for Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty.
Tamila Tasheva, the Permanent Representative of the President of Ukraine in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, remarked that since the full-scale invasion began, over 1,000 Ukrainian citizens have faced persecution for opposing the occupation, supporting Ukraine, displaying national symbols, and holding pro-Ukrainian views. Tasheva underscored the need for developing reintegration policies and detailed Ukraine’s steps towards the de-occupation of Crimea. This includes decisions on restoring public authority, administrative-territorial structure, education, memory policy, and the rights of indigenous peoples.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy briefly discussed Kyiv’s strategy for achieving victory in the war, mentioning that he will consult with U.S. President Joe Biden as well as presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris before the second peace summit later this year. He noted that if the plan receives support from international partners, it could facilitate Ukraine’s efforts to compel Russia to end the conflict.
— Lisa Noskova
Western partners are urging Ukraine to develop a Plan B for war with Russia
Western officials are urging Ukraine to develop a “Plan B” in its war with Russia and to set more realistic goals for the coming year. According to The Wall Street Journal, while Western support for Ukraine to reclaim all its occupied territory remains strong, there is increasing pressure for Kyiv to outline more attainable objectives. This adjustment is intended to help Western diplomats justify continued support to their constituents.
WSJ reports that discussions between Ukraine and its allies reveal growing tension. Some European diplomats have warned Ukrainian officials that achieving a complete victory would require hundreds of billions of dollars, a sum that neither Washington nor Europe can feasibly provide.
This diplomatic pressure comes as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy prepares to visit the U.S., where he plans to meet with presidential candidates Donald Trump and Kamala Harris to present his strategy for Ukraine’s success and seek additional support.
The publication also notes that U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and British Foreign Secretary David Lammy’s visit to Kyiv on September 11 was intended to assess Ukraine’s current needs. Meanwhile, U.S. National Security Advisor John Kirby emphasized that the visit is not meant to push Ukraine into negotiations.
— Lisa Noskova
Analysis: What Ukraine’s Kursk Incursion Tells Us About Putin’s Russia
Given that Ukraine's Kursk incursion was the first foreign invasion of Russia since World War II, Russia’s fierce retaliation should have followed. Instead, Russian authorities pretended that this was nothing but a local crisis and a temporary setback. The reality is more complex and the implications are more serious than the Kremlin would like to admit. Read more in a new analysis by FPRI Fellow Olga Khvostunova.
Quickfire: Regions
Russia’s army started a counter-offensive in the Kursk Region this week. Its goal is to push back the Ukrainian troops that are controlling around 1,000 square kilometers of Russian territory, including the key gas transmission hub Sudzha that has been occupied since early August. This was confirmed both by Russian war bloggers and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Russian forces reportedly achieved a breakthrough near Korenevo and Snagost, but, according to Ukrainian sources, this required them to reposition troops from the southern front in Ukraine (all while Russia has continued its offensive in Ukraine’s Donetsk Region). The Russian counter-attack coincides with a warning by Sergei Shoigu, the Secretary of Russia’s Security Council, that Russia would not conduct negotiations with Ukraine before regaining full control over the Kursk Region. This marks somewhat of a departure from the federal government’s prior communication, which aimed to downplay the importance and the extent of the Kursk incursion, and likely aims to stave off the political risks inherent in a new round of mobilization. Meanwhile, both the federal and regional governments announced further money for reconstruction in the region as well as for residents who lost their property, raising the tally to more than 20 billion rubles ($222.2 million) allocated for various payments (not counting the loss of assets, mostly in agriculture). However, local residents have been complaining for weeks about slow or insufficient payouts.
The InterRAO company, Russia’s leading energy exporter, announced that Russian electricity exports to China in 2024 would be lower than 1 billion kWh, less than a third of what Russia exported a year prior. The company added that this is because of a growing energy deficit in Russia’s Far East, which the country’s current energy generation facilities are unable to close. The issue was raised recently at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok and is unlikely to be resolved soon. It is vital for Russia’s forced trade pivot to Asian markets to build infrastructure—including electrified railways and housing—in its Siberian and Far Eastern regions. In recent years, power cuts affecting whole city districts or towns have become increasingly frequent even in other regions that had seen construction booms, and traders will likely face growing tariffs to pay for electrification.
Andrei Kutepov, a member of the Federation Council from St. Petersburg and the head of its Committee on Economic Policy, suggested a reduction of the coefficient used to calculate taxes on rare earth metal mining by more than a third. Kutepov specifically mentioned that the tax burden, which the federal government had recently raised, was so high that it endangered the development of rare earth metal deposits, such as a titanium and zirconium project owned by the state-owned nuclear company Rosatom in the Tomsk Region. The suggestion to reduce taxes on the mining of rare earth metals comes as Vladimir Putin hinted at limiting Russia’s export of uranium, titanium, and nickel on September 11 as an answer to Western sanctions. Russia currently controls around 5% of the global market of uranium.
— Andras Toth-Czifra