Conflict of interests at Volgograd Polling Station No. 455 - REC member (+video)

Polling Station No. 455 in Volgograd, where on September 18 a lot of people voted by means of the so-called "absentee voting certificates", is located in the hospital, where Nina Cherniaeva, a candidate for the State Duma from the "Edinaya Rossiya" (United Russia) Party, is the Chief Physician.

"The Chief Physician of the hospital is on the federal list of candidates for MPs of the party in power; therefore, I think, it's no accident that the hospital staff was forced to vote under absentee certificates at Polling Station No. 455, not at their residences," Valery Kotelnikov, a member of the regional election commission (REC) with an advisory vote of the 83^rd Constituency, told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent. According to his story, in this case a conflict of interests is obvious.

The observers, who monitored the voting at Polling Station No. 455 of Volgograd, have informed the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent today about numerous violations recorded by them there, including the violation of the secrecy of voting and the unattended ballot box. Besides, during the voting at the station, Ella Melnikova, the chair of the precinct election commission (PEC), and Tatiana Tolmachova, a PEC member, obstructed the work of journalists and Sergo Narsiya, an observer from the PARNAS Party, forcing them to stop filming and take the place, from which they could not monitor the process, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.