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Kremlin Choice Wins in Chechnya Election
By Mike Eckel, Associated Press Writer for Yahoo News
August 30, 2004
Photo by Viktor Korotayev/ Reuters for Yahoo Photos
Grozny, Russia -- The Russian government's candidate to lead warring Chechnya easily won a presidential election held in the wake of last week's terrorist destruction of two airliners, election officials said Monday. The opposition charged voting was tainted by fraud.
Alu Alkhanov, the region's top police official, replaces Kremlin-backed president Akhmad Kadyrov, who was assassinated in a bomb attack in May.
Alkhanov received nearly 74 percent of the vote in Sunday's balloting, Chechen elections commission head Abdul-Kerim Arsakhanov said.
Other candidates complained of widespread violations in a vote that was shadowed by violence, including a man who blew himself up near a polling station in the Chechen capital Grozny.
Alkhanov also had received widespread coverage on local television and radio, while the six other candidates were seen little.
Worries about terrorism were stoked by the crashes of the Russian airliners five days before the election; officials said traces of explosives were found in the wreckage, and there are suspicions two Chechen women conducted the suicide attacks.
Candidate Abdullah Bugayev said he had formally complained to election officials after seeing several violations, including an Alkhanov campaign worker who ordered people to vote for him at a polling station. A representative of Movsur Khamidov, another candidate, said he found ballot boxes at a polling place stuffed shortly after the station opened.
The election was part of the Kremlin's strategy try to undermine support for separatist rebels who have been fighting Russian forces for nearly five years by inducing a sense of civil order in the republic.
An election last October based on that strategy brought Kadyrov to power, but he was killed in a bomb blast in Grozny, the Chechen capital, in May. Fighting, violent crime and abductions have continued unabated.
At one polling station in Grozny, a man was killed in an explosion after he approached with a suspicious package. When guards asked to see the package, "He began to run. It blew up. He died," elections commission head Arsakhanov said on Russian NTV television.
No other casualties were reported and the polling station continued to operate, authorities said.
Election officials reported turnout of around 80 percent, Russian news agencies said. However, little activity was seen at some polling stations.
Police and soldiers were out in force, riding in cars or manning checkpoints. Pedestrians were scarce on Grozny's streets, many of which are lined with war-shattered apartment buildings with collapsed floors and large holes in their facades.
Russian forces have been unable to wipe out Chechen rebels in two wars over the past decade and the Kremlin, refusing to negotiate, has focused on trying to restore civil society in the republic.
However, recent weeks indicate that the separatists remain determined in their fight. On Aug. 21, some 30 people were reported killed in a night of attacks on police stations and patrols in Grozny.
In addition, suspicions have mounted that Chechen fighters or their supporters brought down two Russian airliners that crashed nearly simultaneously on Tuesday. Officials say traces of explosives were found in the wreckage of both planes and that they are investigating two Chechen women who were among the passengers - one aboard each plane.
Chechnya's more than 1 million residents live in a largely dysfunctional region. Nearly three-quarters of the population are without work. Electricity and telephone service are largely nonexistent. Tens of thousands of people have fled, mostly to neighboring regions. Hundreds have disappeared in kidnappings blamed on separatist fighters, Russian forces and allied paramilitaries.
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