WASHINGTON, March 12. /TASS/. Early voting in the Russian presidential election ended on Sunday without any incident to report in the American cities of Miami (Florida), Atlanta (Georgia), Chicago (Illinois) and Minneapolis (Minnesota), Nikolay Lakhonin, a spokesman for the Russian Embassy in the United States, told TASS.
"The voting is over, everything went smoothly, without any incidents," he noted. According to Lakhonin, compatriots’ associations play an active role in organizing the process and informing voters. In all four cities, eight hours - from 08:00 to 16:00 local time (15:00-23:00 Moscow time) - were allocated for the voting.
According to the embassy, both Russian citizens permanently residing in the United States and those who are staying in the country temporarily took part in the vote in Atlanta. Russian nationals from others states, such as Alabama, Kentucky, New York, Tennessee, South and North Carolina and the Federal District of Columbia came to the polling stations as well.
The Russian Consulate General in New York earlier informed TASS that the voting in the cities of Boston (Massachusetts), Albany (New York) and Philadelphia (Pennsylvania) had ended without any incidents to report. Early voting is also held in the Californian cities of San Francisco, San Jose and Los Angeles, which is not over yet.
To conduct voting in the United States on March 18, polling stations will open in the Russian diplomatic missions - in the Embassy in Washington, DC, the Consulates General in New York, Seattle (Washington) and Houston (Texas).
Russia's presidential election will be held on March 18. Eight contenders are vying for the presidential office. They are incumbent head of state Vladimir Putin who is seeking another presidential term as an independent candidate for Russia’s highest public office, LDPR leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky, businessman Pavel Grudinin running as the Communist Party of the Russian Federation’s candidate, Yabloko party co-founder Grigory Yavlinsky, leader of the Party of Growth and business ombudsman Boris Titov, head of the Russian People’s Union party Sergey Baburin, TV personality and socialite Ksenia Sobchak (nominated by Civil Initiative) and leader of the Communists of Russia Maxim Suraikin.