Candidates of the ruling party "United Russia" convincingly won the elections for governors in the regions of Russia, according to the official results published today, reports DPA.

The candidates of the ruling party won with a convincing majority and won all the elective positions – 21 in total. The governor of the northern city of St. Petersburg, Alexander Beglov, performed the weakest, according to the initial results, winning slightly less than 60 percent of the support in the elections.

Beglov is considered unpopular due to the poor work of the St. Petersburg administration. Independent observers complain of strong involvement in the governance of the city, where Russian President Vladimir Putin was born. The official counting of the election results in St. Petersburg has not yet been completed.

In other regions, United Russia candidates won close to 80 percent of the vote – for example, Igor Babushkin in Astrakhan Oblast with 78,17 percent, and Vladimir Vladimirov in Stavropol Krai with 79,61 percent.

In the Kursk region partially occupied by Ukrainian forces, the region's interim governor, Alexander Smirnov, received 65 percent support. Special polling stations were opened for approximately 120.000 evacuated residents of the area.

In the local elections held on Friday and Saturday in Russia, members of several regional parliaments were also elected. The vote is considered a test of the population's support for the Kremlin's policies, almost two and a half years after the start of the war in Ukraine, DPA points out.