She casts her vote at a polling station in Moscow in the presidential elections (Anatolia)

The voting process in the Russian presidential elections continues for the second day in a row, ending tomorrow, Sunday, while the ruling United Russia party said that it is being subjected to a large-scale electronic attack that hinders the use of the Internet and targets its services.

In addition to President Vladimir Putin, the most prominent candidate to win a fifth term for a period of 6 years, three other candidates representing political parties in the Duma are competing in these elections.

The voting process witnessed individual attempts to thwart the voting process, such as throwing Molotov cocktails and using colored liquids to empty them into one of the ballot boxes. The ruling United Russia Party also suspended non-essential services to repel the large-scale cyber attack it was being exposed to.

Putin - who is running in the presidential elections as an independent candidate with the support of the United Russia party - has accused Ukraine of seeking to sabotage the elections in Russia.

The voting process takes place in more than 94,000 ballot boxes across the country between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m., and the number of registered voters inside the country is 112 million 309 thousand and 947 voters, 2 million 890 thousand and 863 in Russian representations abroad, and 11 thousand and 924 registered voters at the Russian Baikonur space base. In Kazakhstan.

Presidential elections are also being held for the first time in the Ukrainian regions that Russia recently annexed to its sovereignty, namely the provinces of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporozhye, and Kherson, in addition to the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia annexed in 2014.

Putin is most likely to win a fifth term in 6 years (Anatolia)

International condemnation

In this regard, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, along with dozens of member states of the organization, condemned the holding of presidential elections in the Ukrainian regions under Russian control.

Guterres' spokesman Stephane Dujarric said in a statement, "The Secretary-General condemns the efforts of the Russian Federation to organize presidential elections in areas of Ukraine occupied by the Russian Federation, and recalls that the illegal attempt to annex areas of Ukraine is invalid according to international law."

Dujarric stressed the UN's adherence to Ukraine's "independence" and "territorial integrity."

For her part, Rosemary DiCarlo, Assistant Secretary-General for Political Affairs, stressed during a UN Security Council meeting at the invitation of Slovenia devoted to this vote that organizing the vote in Ukrainian territories under Russian control is “unacceptable.”

She continued, "According to international law, the occupation authorities - in this case the Russian Federation - are obliged to respect the laws of Ukraine in the occupied territories."

Ukrainian Ambassador Sergei Kyslytsya read to the press a joint declaration by more than 50 countries - including the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Japan, Australia and South Korea - that "condemned in the strongest terms" the organization of the vote in several Ukrainian regions.

The statement stressed that "organizing elections in another United Nations member state without its approval is a clear disdain for the principles of sovereignty and territorial integrity," recalling the relevant resolutions of the United Nations General Assembly.

Yesterday, Friday, Dmitry Polyansky, the Russian Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations, considered that these criticisms represented interference in Russia’s internal affairs, and stressed that these lands “are administratively and politically part of our country, whether you like it or not.”

Source: Agencies