Rich Moscow backs Putin, rejects liberals in poll

By Anatoly Titkin

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Pro-democracy rallies in Moscow once attracted hundreds of thousands, but voters in the booming Russian capital overwhelmingly backed President Vladimir Putin in Sunday's parliamentary poll, which sidelined liberal parties.

The pro-Kremlin United Russia party won more than 54 percent of the vote in Moscow after emphasizing the stability achieved during Putin's eight-year rule and warning of a return to the chaos of the 1990s should voters choose his liberal opponents.

The 55-year-old ex-KGB agent, who is due to step down as president next year, headed the list of candidates for United Russia, which won a landslide victory in an election criticized in Europe and denounced by international observers as unfair.

His criticisms of past governments, and jibes at pro-Western liberal parties as jackals "slinking through foreign embassies" appealed to many Muscovites, despite the capital's glitzy boutiques and roads congested with Western-built cars.

"There are still .... too many of those willing to restore what there used to be before," said pensioner Yuri Albertovich, referring to the 1990s, when Russia enjoyed a political honeymoon with the West but suffered a humiliating economic collapse.

"This is why it is nice to realize that more than half of the population, having listened attentively to the president, finally voted for him."

"DIRTY TRICKS"

Putin warned his countrymen during the campaign that the opposition was seeking Western support to play "dirty tricks" and that foreign governments were trying to "poke snotty noses" into Russian politics.

Liberal parties did not win a single seat in Sunday's poll, in which United Russia secured almost six times as many votes at its nearest challenger, the Communists.

"I don't think the support figure (for United Russia) is too high. This is just normal," said Natalya, a middle-aged woman living in Moscow. "I myself voted for United Russia because it seems to me it means confidence in Putin."

Ivan Sokolov, a young man in a stylish overcoat, also said he thought the officially reported voter support for United Russia was "normal".

"It could have been worse, it could have been better -- it just happened this way. I hope for a bright and better future, for higher wages and for highly qualified specialists who will stay to work in Russia," he said.

Anastasia, a young woman in her 20s, said she had cast her ballot for the Liberal Democratic Party of nationalist firebrand Vladimir Zhirinovsky.

Zhirinovsky's party finished fourth with 7.2 percent in Moscow, trailing the Communists with around 14 percent and pro-Putin Fair Russia with 7.7 percent.

"I believe the outcome of the election had been decided beforehand," said Anastasia, rushing along Moscow's upmarket Tverskaya Street.