Pro-Kremlin party claims wide support in polls

By Aidar Buribayev

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's ruling party, facing its first major electoral test amidst the economic crisis, claimed strong support in local elections on Sunday but the opposition Communists and nationalists complained of cheating.

Few official results were available on Sunday night but United Russia chairman Boris Gryzlov told local media his party "was showing high results" in all nine regions holding elections for regional and municipal legislatures.

"This cohesion around the party of the majority, its chairman (Prime Minister) Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev... this support is crucial today when the economic crisis is trying to grip Russia," Gryzlov said.

Millions have lost their jobs, prices have risen and the rouble has slumped against the dollar since the crisis hit Russia late last year, ending the 10-year boom which had underpinned support for Putin and Medvedev.

Opposition parties denounced the Kremlin for what they said was an unusually high level of dirty tricks in the campaign preceding Sunday's polls, when 20 million Russians were eligible to vote for some town councils, regional parliaments and mayors.

Communist Party Central Committee chairman Pyotr Romanov said United Russia's behavior in the western region of Bryansk bordering Belarus suggested foul play on a grand scale.

"Tonight we are duty bound to shout about large-scale falsifications," he told Reuters on Sunday evening.

Romanov cited protocols from five polling stations in Bryansk's central Oktyabr district which he said showed the Communist Party "trounced" United Russia. First official results in the same place gave the Communists only 15 percent.