Putin Opponents Protest Kremlin Victory Amid Fraud Claims

Vladimir Putin, who won another six years at the Kremlin amid allegations of fraud, faces rising discontent among the country’s urban middle class that owes its success to prosperity under his rule.

“Our society has no future,” Oleg Ermolaev, 34, the head of a company that designs power networks, said as he cast his ballot against Putin in Moscow on March 4. Ermolaev, who voted for billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov, was among the tens of thousands who protested after alleged fraud in a Dec. 4 parliamentary vote in the biggest anti-Putin rallies.