Moscow, 27 January: Member of the political council of the Union of Right Forces party Boris Nemtsov believes that the Central Electoral Commission's refusal to register Mikhail Kasyanov as a candidate in the Russian presidential election was a political decision.

"It is perfectly obvious that it was a political decision," Nemtsov told Interfax on Sunday (27 January).

"Just as political was the decision to grant registration to Bogdanov (Andrey Bogdanov is the leader of the Democratic Party of Russia - Interfax), an absolute unknown who had miraculously gained 2m admirers," he added.

Nemtsov pointed out that with Kasyanov taking no part in the campaign, the legitimacy of the presidential election was seriously reduced. He believes that in the circumstances CPRF (Communist Party of the Russian Federation) leader Gennadiy Zyuganov would be best advised to withdraw from the election. "The only representative of the opposition among the candidates for the presidential post, the CPRF leader, should seriously consider how advisable it is to participate in this farce. It is, after all, perfectly obvious now that there will be no equal access to the TV, no honest and open TV debates with Dmitriy Medvedev, and no equal political fight, so any independent politician's participation in the election campaign completely discredits both him and the party he leads," Nemtsov said.

For his part, deputy chairman of the Yabloko party and head of its Moscow branch Sergey Mitrokhin told Interfax: "The Russian united democratic party Yabloko believes that the presidential election had been turned into a farce from the very beginning, and will not take part in this farce."

Commenting on the Central Electoral Commission's refusal to register Mikhail Kasyanov as a candidate for the post of Russian president, Mitrokhin stressed that "when the election itself is phoney, it is absurd to accuse someone of submitting phoney signatures".

"What is remarkable is not that for one of the self-nominated candidates it all went wrong with the signatures but that for the other (i.e. Bogdanov) it all went very well," he said.