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Members of Khabarovsk regional branch of Russia’s Communist Party presented on Tuesday the satirical medal ‘For Assistance in Election Fraud’ to Viktor Tsyrfa, head of the regional election committee, as part of their actions to protest the ‘fraudulent December State Duma elections.’

The medal was handed personally to Tsyrfa during one of the rallies, organized by the local Communist Party and Patriots of Russia party branches.

“Until the next presidential elections we plan to continue with the events to protest the frauds of the Duma elections,” Dmitry Kovalchuk, head of Khabarovsk’s branch of Patriots of Russia said according to Regnum news agency. He added that, “by holding this picket we reminded the prosecutor’s office and the election committee of their negligence towards numerous violations during the elections.”

At the protest members of Patriots of Russia branch also handed medals ‘For Souvenir Democracy’ to the prosecutors and election officials, allegedly hinting that souvenirs are just cheap imitations of real things kept on a dusty shelf and from time to time shown off to curious guests. The agency did not report any reaction from those who were awarded medals.

During the national elections to the State legislature, held December 2, pro-Kremlin United Russia party gathered 64.1 percent of the vote receiving 315 of the 450 seats in the Duma. The Communist Party also captured seats in the legislature gaining 11 percent of the vote. Other parties which won representation in the Duma are the Liberal Democratic Party and A Just Russia.

The elections were criticized by international observers, who called them undemocratic. According to Goran Lennmarker, President of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe's Parliamentary Assembly (OSCE PA), the elections “failed to meet many of the commitments and standards in the OSCE and the Council of Europe and thus [the elections] cannot be considered free.”