Putin’s man loses

Communist Sergei Levchenko has been elected governor of Siberia’s Irkutsk region, the first Russian politician from a nominal opposition party to win a vote for regional governor since the Kremlin restored such elections in 2012. Levchenko, a member of the State Duma lower house of parliament in Moscow, easily defeated the incumbent, Sergei Yeroshenko, from United Russia, President Vladimir Putin’s political party. The positions of governor of Russia’s 85 regions are among the most powerful in the country. From 2005 until 2012 they were appointed by the Kremlin, and since then United Russia candidates or Kremlin supporters have won all elections.