Russian opposition leader writes to Putin demanding the right to run for office

The anti-corruption activist and prominent opposition leader Alexey Navalny has penned an open letter to President Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, and Russia's human rights commissioner, Ella Pamfilova, demanding access to the ballot for himself and his political party, the Party of Progress.

The letter comes as Putin earlier today announced the start of Russia's campaign season, with parliamentary elections scheduled for September.

In his letter, Navalny begins by declaring, “I'm for participation in the elections. I want to participate in the elections. I demand participation in the elections.” He argues that Russians should be less concerned with the question of whom they should support and more concerned with the question of what precisely elections are.

Navalny calls on Putin, Medvedev, and Pamfilova to allow him a place on the ballot this September, and he demands that the authorities reverse the Justice Ministry's “illegal decision” to deny his political party official registration.

Thanks to a law signed by Vladimir Putin in February 2014, former convicts (even those with suspended sentences) cannot run for political office for 10 years after their prison or probation terms expire. (For more serious crimes, this prohibition lasts 15 years.)

Navalny, who won 27 percent of the vote in the 2013 Moscow mayoral race, is currently serving out two suspended criminal sentences, one five-year sentence handed down in July 2013 for embezzling roughly half a million dollars of lumber from a state-owned company, and another three-and-a-half-year sentence handed down in December 2014 for embezzling money from a subsidiary of the cosmetics company Yves Rocher. Navalny says he is innocent of all charges, which are widely regarded outside Russia to be politicized.

Based on Russia's 2014 law and Navalny's criminal record, he will not be eligible to run for elected office until mid-2028, pending any new convictions or reductions in his probation. He would be 52 years old by then.