MOSCOW, March 4 (Itar-Tass) — Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, a presidential nominee, and his wife Lyudmila arrived at polling station No. 2079 at the Russian Academy of Sciences in the Kosygin Street.
He shook hands with a staff member of the election commission, received a ballot paper and went into a cabin for voting. Then Putin approached one of electronic boxes, with which the station is equipped (so-called system for processing ballot papers) and dropped his ballot.
Putin had repeatedly voted at this poll. It is here he voted for United Russia during the December elections to the sixth State Duma.
This station experiences an increased attention this Sunday. Several dozens of representatives of the Russian and foreign press gathered at the hall of the Academy of Sciences. Observers from political parties and candidates were also present.
First voters came to the poll at 08.00. Security measures were not reinforced in connection with Putin’s arrival, and the access of voters was not restricted. True, residents of the Gagarin district of Moscow had to show their domestic passports not only to members of the election commission, but also to guards at the control point of the Academy of Sciences.