Russian panel rejects 2 presidential bids

MOSCOW, Jan. 27 (UPI) -- The Russian Central Election Committee Friday rejected applications from Yabloko Party founder Grigory Yavlinsky and another man to be presidential candidates.

Committee Secretary Nikolai Konkin said that although Yavlinsky collected 2 million signatures supporting his bid, two reviews of the signatures indicated 25.66 percent of them were invalid, RIA Novosti reported. The law allows only 5 percent.

The election is March 4.

The committee also rejected an application by Irkutsk Gov. Dmitry Mezentsev, saying the number of signatures was below 2 million. When a sample of 105,000 signatures found more than 15,000 were invalid, the panel said it stopped the verification process.

Billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov was the only independent presidential candidate who submitted a valid list of signatures and was certified to run in the presidential election, RIA Novosti said.

The four other registered candidates are Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, moderate social democratic leader Sergei Mironov, populist leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky and communist leader Gennady Zyuganov.