Incumbents and other loyalists of President Vladimir Putin and his United Russia party were expected to coast to victory in most of the 21 regional governorships and other local voting that wrapped up in Russian elections that most rights groups and independent experts agree lacked any genuine competition.
Three days of balloting concluded late on September 8 in the votes, which include for a Moscow City Duma and the leadership of Russia's second city, St. Petersburg.
All of the current or acting governors in the races appeared headed to hugely one-sided contests, with only one challenger in double digits in the early tally results.
Russian authorities appear eager to tout the lop-sided contests of hand-picked Putin loyalists and other candidates as an exercise of patriotism 2 1/2 years into Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, which Russian censors describe as a "special military operation" amid an intense clampdown on possible dissent.
"Let's be honest: There's a war going on. Our task is to defeat our enemy," Dmitry Medvedev, a former president and prime minister and longtime Putin ally who now chairs the ruling United Russia party and serves as deputy chairman of the country's Security Council, said according to Russian state news agency TASS.
Twenty-four years into Putin's rule, Russia's elections are more tightly controlled than ever, lacking of any credible international observer missions and with genuine opposition candidates frequently disqualified or badly hamstrung.
The nationwide regional and local vote processes included ballot collections staged in parts of Ukraine occupied and unilaterally annexed by Russia, including Crimea, to fill Moscow-backed regional legislatures.
Ukraine's Foreign Ministry condemned the processes in the occupied regions as a violation of international law. "We emphasize once again that the results of the so-called 'elections' in the temporarily occupied territory of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea…are worthless, and the 'elections' themselves are illegitimate,” the ministry said ahead of the voting.
A group defending voters' rights, Golos, dubbed the vote an "imitation" of elections, saying it lacks genuine competition.
It said more than one-third of candidates were barred by Russian election authorities from participating in the votes across the country.
The vote collection lasted three days.
The head of the Russian Central Election Commission, Ella Pamfilova, said there were no significant violations during the balloting and turnout was around 90 percent.
Golos said it received more than 500 accusations of violations during the election campaign alone.