RUSSIA’S UPPER HOUSE ADOPTS ‘EXTREMIST’ BILL TO BAR CRITICS FROM ELECTIONS

MOSCOW: Russia’s upper house on Wednesday overwhelmingly backed legislation expected to be used to ban allies of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny from running in elections, the latest move in a crackdown on the opposition.

The bill, overwhelmingly approved by the federation council, would make it impossible to run in parliamentary elections for leaders, sponsors and rank-and-file members of “extremist” groups.

A Russian court is considering whether to designate Navalny’s political network an extremist organisation and could make a decision as early as next week. Critics of President Vladimir Putin say Russian authorities are widening a campaign against the opposition ahead of parliamentary elections in September.

After Navalny was jailed and many of his allies arrested, two more political activists, Dmitry Gudkov and Andrei Pivovarov, were detained over the past two days. Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said the detentions were a purely legal matter.