MOSCOW, September 18. /TASS/. Russia’s opposition party PARNAS has taken a decision to take part in the parliamentary elections in 2016 as part of the so-called ‘Democratic Coalition’ with the registration-stripped Party of Progress led by Alexei Navalny, PARNAS’ deputy leader Ilya Yashin told TASS on Friday.

"The party’s political council discussed the results of the September 13 elections to the Kostroma Region Duma [legislature] at its meeting on Friday. The political council ruled these elections were stage one in the preparations for the elections to the State Duma [lower house of the Russian parliament] in 2016. We agreed that our coalition is viable and we will take part in the State Duma elections within the Democratic Coalition," he said.

Apart from that, he said the party’s political council had adopted a statement "in support of party activists persecuted by the authorities."

The Kostroma region was the only Russian constituent entity where candidates from the so-called ‘Democratic Coalition’ vied for seats in the regional legislature. They scored 2.28% of the vote and won no seats. The PARNAS party, the basis of the coalition, recognized its failure at the elections and refrained from challenging their results.