Incumbent Russian President Vladimir Putin gestures to people at an occasion in Moscow, Russia, on March 18, 2018. Incumbent Russian President Vladimir Putin was set to win his fourth term as he got 75.91 percent of the votes after 70 percent of the ballots were counted, preliminary data from the Central Election Commission (CEC) showed. (Xinhua/Wu Zhuang)
MOSCOW, March 19 (Xinhua) -- Incumbent Russian President Vladimir Putin won 76.6 percent of ballots after 99.83 percent of votes had been counted in the presidential election Sunday, Central Election Commission (CEC) chair Ella Pamfilova confirmed Monday.
In accordance with the law, a candidate garnering more than half of the votes goes to the Kremlin.
Communist Party candidate Pavel Grudinin, Putin's nearest rival, got 11.9 percent of votes, while the head of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, received 5.66 percent, according to the CEC. Five other candidates gained substantially less support.
The voter turnout stood at around 67.5 percent, meaning some 73.4 million Russians cast their ballots.
The final result of the election, the seventh since Russia introduced the presidential system in 1991, will be confirmed by the CEC within 10 days.
