The Russian Election Commission confirmed the preliminary results of the weekend's parliamentary election Thursday, with President Vladimir Putin's United Russia winning 64.3 per cent of the vote after 100 per cent of the ballots had been counted, according to dpa. The news came as 30,000 members of the pro-Kremlin youth group Nashi blocked the streets of Moscow on Thursday to celebrate Putin's victory in Sunday's vote for the State Duma. The Communist Party was confirmed as the second largest party with 11.57 per cent of the vote. Two smaller parties also managed to cross the 7-per-cent threshold to enter the Duma: the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party with 8.14 per cent and the pro-Putin Fair Russia party with 7.74 per cent. In the fourth and largest of daily rallies begun on election day, Russian television showed pro-Putin youths parading from the Vasilyevsky Spusk square near the Kremlin, holding flags and decked in uniform white capes inked red with the slogan "Our Victory" and sketches of Putin.
