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Prosecutor confirms Sobyanin runs in Moscow mayoral election legitimately

The prosecutor asked the Moscow City Court to turn down Alexei Navalny's lawsuit demanding to expel Sobyanin from the election race

Photo ITAR-TASS/Alexei Nikolsky

Photo ITAR-TASS/Alexei Nikolsky

MOSCOW, August 22 (Itar-Tass) - A representative of the Russian Prosecutor's office has declared at court hearings at the Moscow City Court on Thursday that she found no violations in registering Acting city mayor Sergei Sobyanian a candidate running in the election of the Moscow mayor.

The prosecutor asked the Moscow City Court to turn down Alexei Navalny's lawsuit in which the opposition candidate demanded to expel Sobyanin from the election race.

Representatives of the opposition candidate called into question the authenticity of President Putin's signature on a document in which Putin gave his consent to the nomination of Sergei Sobyanin a candidate for the post of the Moscow mayor. The lawyers representing Alexei Navalny attempted to organize an expert authenticity check of President Putin's signature and summon him to court to testify, but the Moscow City Court has turned their claims down as irrelative to the essence of the case.

"In our opinion the president's consent to Sobyanin's nomination was presented in a written form after Sobyanin had been registered a candidate, and we doubt the authenticity of this document," Navalny's lawyers said.

A representative of the Moscow Election Commission has dismissed the lawyers' doubts as "fantasies." "I have heard quite a lot of fantasies today. I personally accepted the documents from Sergei Sobyanin when he was being registered. President Putin's consent was among the documents Sobyanin submitted, and the authenticity of this document aroused no doubt," the representative testified.

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