Russia’s Supreme Court has barred the liberal Yabloko party from taking part in September’s parliamentary election, removing the only officially registered party openly opposed to Moscow’s war in Ukraine from the ballot.
The court ruled on Monday in favour of a lawsuit brought by the small pro-Kremlin nationalist Rodina party, which accused Yabloko of receiving undeclared campaign support, including from Western sources.
Yabloko leader Nikolai Rybakov rejected the allegations and vowed to appeal, describing the case as an attack on political freedom aimed at eliminating rivals.
“Excluding Yabloko from the election means refusing dialogue with people who ask questions that are uncomfortable for the authorities,” he said.
Several hundred supporters, many of them young, gathered outside the Supreme Court during the hearing as police stood nearby. Some carried apples in reference to the party’s name, which means “apple” in Russian.
Once a major liberal force in post-Soviet Russia, Yabloko now holds only a small number of regional seats and has no representation in the national parliament.
However, the September election campaign had given the party a platform to promote its call for Russia to sign a ceasefire agreement with Ukraine.
The Kremlin has repeatedly rejected calls for an unconditional ceasefire, saying any settlement must address what Moscow describes as the underlying causes of the conflict and meet its security demands.
The ruling comes as President Vladimir Putin’s United Russia and other broadly pro-Kremlin parties are expected to maintain their dominance in parliament.
Public opposition to the war remains difficult to measure amid restrictions on dissent and wartime censorship laws.
However, the independent Levada Center found that 66 per cent of Russians surveyed in July supported the actions of Russia’s armed forces in Ukraine, the lowest level recorded by the pollster since the full-scale invasion began in February 2022.
Russian authorities have intensified restrictions on anti-war politicians, activists and independent media since the invasion.
Last month, politician Boris Nadezhdin, who had sought to run for parliament on an anti-war platform, was designated a “foreign agent” and subsequently left Russia.
Rybakov argued that Yabloko’s exclusion showed growing public interest in an alternative to the Kremlin’s approach, saying the “demand for peace and freedom” had proved stronger than authorities expected.
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