MOSCOW �� Russia's Central Election Commission refused to register opposition leader Alexei Navalny as a candidate in the 2018 presidential elections, confirming warnings that he wouldn't be allowed on the ballot because of a criminal conviction.
Navalny, an anti-corruption activist and critic of President Vladimir Putin, denounced the case against him as a politically motivated effort to keep him off the ballot. The European Court of Human Rights pronounced his conviction illegal, but he was re-tried and found guilty on the same charges and given a five-year suspended sentence in February.
"These sentences were falsified," Navalny told the election commission in Moscow. "No one will recognize the election process or the results."
Chairwoman Ella Pamfilova responded angrily that the panel didn't have the legal authority to overlook his criminal conviction. "You're swindling the youth of the country," she said before lecturing Navalny on how to conduct "a smarter, more careful" political campaign.
After the decision, Navalny released a pre-recorded video on Twitter calling for "a voters' strike" �� a boycott of the election �� and pledging to monitor the election for violations and refusing to recognize the results.
Navalny announced his plan to run for the presidency a year ago, defying repeated warnings from officials that he would not be allowed on the ballot because of a legal provision that blocks people with serious criminal convictions from running until at least a decade after completing their sentences.
Thousands of his supporters demonstrated in more than a dozen cities around Russia Sunday in support of his candidacy.
Navalny emerged as an organizer of mass protests over alleged ballot rigging in 2011-2012, the biggest demonstrations since Putin took power almost 20 years ago. In 2013, Navalny got nearly enough votes to force a run-off against a Putin ally in the Moscow mayoral election. Over the past year, his anti-Kremlin protests have attracted large crowds in cities across the country, including thousands of young people.
Putin is expected to win a fourth presidential term easily in the March election. This month, he defended the decision to keep opposition figures like Navalny out of political life, comparing him to former President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia, who is widely reviled in Russia for his role in the 2008 war between the two countries.
