Western observers voice concern as Russia votes

By Conor Sweeney

MOSCOW (Reuters) - The small band of western observers covering Russia's presidential poll on Sunday expressed concerns at voting irregularities and the conduct of the campaign in the run-up to the election.

And an independent Russian watchdog said its observers had foiled attempts to stuff ballot boxes in polling stations in the Moscow region before voting commenced.

The 23 parliamentarians from the Council of Europe's parliamentary assembly are the only regular Western observation team covering the vast country after two of the three main election watchdog teams declined invitations.

"Our doubts within the Council of Europe delegation are more to do with the campaign, where there was unequal access to the media," Polish parliamentarian Tadeusz Iwinski told Reuters from the city of Yaroslavl, 260 km north of Moscow.

Iwinski said the size of the delegation meant monitoring was restricted to polling stations in Yaroslavl and Russia's two main cities -- Moscow and St Petersburg.

He pointed to the lack of proper television debates, which the lead candidate Dmitry Medvedev declined to attend, as an example of the election's weaknesses.

Golos, a Russian independent poll watchdog, said its 2,000 observers had found other examples of electoral fraud across the country.

"The picture is very grim. It's clear that in the regions where turnout is impossibly high, upwards of 90 percent, the proportion of pro-Medvedev votes are also impossibly high," said Liliya Shibanova, the non-governmental organisation's general director.