MOSCOW, December 24. /TASS/. The Just Russia party will not nominate its candidate for Russian president but will support the candidature of incumbent President Vladimir Putin, the party’s leader, Sergei Mironov, said on Sunday.

"The Just Russia party will not nominate its candidate, we will support Vladimir Putin’s candidature," he told journalists after a meeting of the party’s Central Council Presidium.

"The presidium has passed a political decision and this decision will be tomorrow recommended to the congress," he said. "I am sure the congress will support it."

According to Mironov, few have doubts that Putin win the upcoming elections. "This candidate is the winner. So, if we know the outcome beforehand, why should we nominate our candidate to be in the company of outsiders enjoying miserable support," he said. "We are a socialist party and three basic decisions of the president of the past six months are literally our party’s program provisions. He hears us, we see the tendency."

He said that his party’s representatives would be commissioned to Putin’s election headquarters to help work "on the future agenda."

"If the party’s congress decides to support Putin, it will mean that two out of four parliamentary parties are going to support the incumbent president," Mironov said.

Nevertheless, the Just Russia leader vowed his party would stay in opposition to the ruling United Russia party.

The party congress that is to pass this decision will be held in Moscow on December 25.

Presidential elections in Russia are scheduled for March 18, 2018.