Sobyanin To Be Inaugurated As Moscow Mayor

Muscovites walk past an election poster hanging on the Theater of Satire of incumbent Mayor Sergei Sobyanin ahead of the September 8 voting.

Incumbent Sergei Sobyanin will be inaugurated as mayor of Moscow on September 12, according to an announcement by the Moscow City Election Commission.

The results of the September 8 voting have been confirmed and Sobyanin has officially been declared the winner with 51.37 percent of the votes, the commission said.

The candidate of the opposition Republican Party of Russia-People's Freedom Party (RPR-PARNAS), Aleksei Navalny, came second with 27.24 percent, according to the official results.

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Navalny has insisted the election was rigged.

He and thousands of his supporters held a protest on Moscow's Bolotnaya Square late on September 9, following his demand for a recount.

Navalny, an outspoken critic of the Kremlin, said at the gathering that the poll had given birth to a genuine opposition force in Russia.

Sobyanin, supported by Russian President Vladimir Putin, has served as Moscow's mayor since October 2010.

Based on reporting by rbc.ru and Interfax