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First polling stations for State Duma elections open in Kamchatka and Chukotka

The elections will be monitored by 385 public observers on the peninsula

PETROPAVLOVSK·KAMCHATSKY, September 17. /TASS/. The first day of a three·day voting for the election of deputies to the State Duma has started in the easternmost regions of Russia -- in Kamchatka and Chukotka.

At 8:00 a.m. local time (8:00 p.m. GMT) 178 permanent polling stations opened in Kamchatka, and 54 in Chukotka, officials at the regional election commissions told TASS.

"At 8:00 a.m. (local time) on September 18, 178 permanently operating polling stations opened in Kamchatka, and 225,107 voters were registered," an official at the regional election commission said.

In Chukotka, 54 polling stations opened.

The elections will be monitored by 385 public observers on the peninsula.

Earlier, until 8 p.m. (local time) on September 17 early voting was held in the remote and hard·to·reach areas in the regions. In Kamchatka, about 12,000 people made their choice early, and in Chukotka about 5,000.

Polling stations in Sakhalin and the Magadan Region will open in an hour -- at 00:00 Moscow time on September 18 (9:00 p.m. on September 17); in the Maritime and Khabarovsk regions and the Jewish Autonomous Region, they will open in two hours -- at 1:00 a.m. Moscow time on September 18 (10:00 p.m. GMT on September 17). Subsequently, in the Amur Region, Transbaikalia, and Yakutia, voting will take place at 02:00 a.m. Moscow time (11:00 p.m. GMT); in Buryatia, at 3:00 a.m. Moscow time (00:00 GMT).

The single voting day to elect lawmakers to the 9th Russian State Duma will take place on September 18-20. For the first time ever, residents of the recently incorporated Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, as well as the Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, will participate in legislative elections for the lower house of the Russian parliament. A total of ten parties are taking part in the election: United Russia, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation (CPRF), the Liberal Democratic Party of the Russian Federation (LDPR), New People, A Just Russia - For Truth, the Party of Pensioners for Social Justice, the Communists of Russia, Rodina, the Party of Direct Democracy, as well as the Greens Ecological Party.