France

Paris, September 21, 2026. For the French press, the election that just designated the deputies of the State Duma was more of a formality than an electoral test. According to the official results relayed by Russian agencies and reported by Le Monde, HuffPost France, and 20 Minutes, United Russia, Vladimir Putin's party, garnered 57.5% of the vote after counting three-quarters of the ballots, compared to 14% for the communists and 8.7% for the LDPR, a score that shows significant progress compared to 49.8% in 2021. HuffPost France summed up the atmosphere by headlining that "the winner of these elections was already known; all that remained was to see what their score would be." Le Monde recalled that "no party opposed to the conflict was allowed to run" and that the only party openly anti-war, Yabloko, was disqualified by the Supreme Court.

But it is the developments of the last day of the election, Sunday, September 20, that occupy a large part of the French coverage. According to Sergei Sobyanin, cited by RFI, BFMTV, and Le Monde, the Russian air defense intercepted more than 1,600 drones since Saturday, including 450 targeting Moscow; a refinery in Kapotnya was damaged and two people were killed in the region. The mayor denounced an "unprecedented" attack "planned to disrupt the elections." The head of the electoral commission, Ella Pamfilova, cited by Le Monde, mentioned "more than a thousand" cyberattacks against electronic voting, "signs of Ukrainian interference." The Russian Ministry of Defense promised to "intensify" its strikes on Kyiv.

Le Monde also highlights what the official Russian narrative omits: the strikes that killed at least four people, including three children, near Kiev on the eve of the election. RFI and Le Monde also reported on the gatherings of exiled Russian opponents in front of embassies, from Berlin to Helsinki, to denounce repression and vote against United Russia. For the French press, the combination of a vote without real opposition, cyberattacks invoked by the Russians, and a drone war opened on the eve of the election confirms above all the lack of democratic scope of this election, presented by Vladimir Putin himself as a barometer of support for the war.