Ilya Yashin will challenge Sergey Sobyanin (and Dmitry Gudkov) in Moscow's next mayoral race

Ilya Yashin, the opposition politician who heads Moscow’s Krasnoselsky district council, says he’ll run for mayor in this September’s elections. In an announcement on Wednesday, he described incumbent Mayor Sergey Sobyanin as “hostile and barbarous.” Yashin says he hopes for support from others in the opposition, and named Alexey Navalny and the Anti-Corruption Foundation as his closest allies. Former State Duma deputy Dmitry Gudkov has also said he intends to run for mayor. To avoid splitting the opposition’s votes, Yashin proposes primaries for the city's “democratic movement.”

The capital’s last mayoral elections took place in 2013, when Alexey Navalny won 27 percent of the vote and nearly forced a runoff election against Sergey Sobyanin. Navalny is forbidden from seeking public office now because of a contentious felony conviction (the same conviction that prevented him from appearing on the ballot for the March 18 presidential election).