Moscow - 27 August 2019

1. Various of Ella Pamfilova, Chairman of the Central Election Commission, showing the results of unnamed candidate's signatures inspection (the handwriting of dates next to different signatures looks the same)

2. Central Election Commission hall

3. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Ella Pamfilova, Chairman of the Central Election Commission:

"As a former politician and human rights activists who spent years on human rights I've always stood for freedom, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, free completion at the election - I really wanted - as a person, as Pamfilova, as a citizen, to allow the widest competition possible that everyone get registered."

4. Pamfilova during interview

5. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Ella Pamfilova, Chairman of the Central Election Commission:

"When Vladimir Putin ran for president in 2000, I was the first woman presidential candidate, I was his opponent in those elections. I went through those circles of hell myself, I know how I was attacked in the 1990s. I know what it's like, I know how difficult it is to collect signatures."

6. Pamfilova during interview

7. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Ella Pamfilova, Chairman of the Central Election Commission:

"The system for collecting and verifying signatures has been in operation for many years. Many of the most prominent opposition members and parties have been elected for many years in different government agencies. The good thing about what happened - it showed that the system is outdated, society is not going to forgive us for that, society is asking for a different approach".

8. Pamfilova during interview

9. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Ella Pamfilova, Chairman of the Central Election Commission:

"If those guys really got to the bottom of it, what happened to their signatures, if they had come to us, we would have helped, maybe they would not have gone out to the unsanctioned rallies. I don't know what they are facing charges for, as I understand there will be a trial soon. I don't want to guess what will be the verdict, because there is a presumption of innocence, but I hope it will end well for them.

10. Pamfilova during interview

11. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Ella Pamfilova, Chairman of the Central Election Commission:

"People are asking for more. It's a young, well-off generation that grew up under Putin, and we have to be mindful of that, and we have to understand that that's the generation, like it or not, they are our children, our grandchildren, they need to find their place here, in Russia."

Moscow - 6 August 2019

12. Opposition politician Lyubov Sobol, weak from 24th day of hunger strike, taking her seat with her lawyer

13. Wide of working group

14. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Lyubov Sobol, opposition politician:

"I have no doubt that the decisions should only be taken by Muscovites and now, unfortunately, you Ella Aleksandrovna, are among the people who are forcing Muscovites to fight for their rights by going out onto the streets."

15. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Ella Pamfilova, Chairman of the Central Election Commission of Russia:

"You haven't used this opportunity and you haven't presented any arguments and you've turned this into an ugly debacle!"

16. Pamfilova leaving the meeting

17. Sobol talking to media

ARCHIVE: Moscow - 15 August 2019

18. STILL of Lyubov Sobol, opposition politician ++OVERLAYS AUDIO++

Moscow - 28 August 2019

19. SOUNDBITE (Russian) Lyubov Sobol, opposition politician: ++OVERLAID BY STILL ++

"They (authorities) are taking away from people the right to gather peacefully, unarmed, in a protest to defend their voting rights. We did all we could to get the approval."

Moscow - 10 August 2019

20. Various of riot police running at protests, detaining and dragging away a young disabled man

21. Police detain and drag away young woman UPSOUND (Russian) "My glasses! My glasses! I've lost my glasses! You idiots, my glasses!"

22. Police detain another man, other officers look for more protesters

23. Protesters clapping and shouting slogans

24. Column of riot police

The head of Russia's election commission is standing by a decision to keep a dozen opposition candidates from running for the city legislature in Moscow but concedes the qualification rules are outdated.

The disqualification of the City Duma candidates led to weeks of protests by Muscovites outraged over what they saw as an attempt to prevent President Vladimir Putin's opponents from gaining even lowly positions of power.

Ella Pamfilova, who heads the Central Election Commission, told The Associated Press this week there was nothing she could do to stop what blew over into a major political crisis.

The candidates excluded from the September 8 election said they had presented the required number of signatures, but first Moscow election authorities and then Pamfilova's commission invalidated enough to prevent their participation.

Tens of thousands have taken to the streets in Moscow this summer to protest over the Central Election Commission's decision to take the opposition candidates off the ballot for the election in September.

Many Muscovites see it as yet another humiliation and a blow to Russia's shrinking political arena.

What's more, a dozen unregistered candidates ended up spending weeks in jail for calling for unauthorised protests.

Sixty-five-year-old Pamfilova, a veteran opposition politician and human rights activist, was appointed to head the Central Election Commission in 2016 when President Vladimir Putin vowed to clean up Russia's notoriously corrupt election commissions.

For years the commissions looked aside or directly participated in vote rigging to favour Kremlin candidates at all levels.

Although election observers initially hailed Pamfilova's efforts to clamp down on the most brazen examples of voter fraud, this summer's Moscow City Duma campaign has demonstrated how little has changed.

In Moscow, the law requires independent candidates for the city legislature to submit the signatures of the equivalent of 3 percent of their districts' voters in a procedure that election observers have said is designed to keep the opposition candidates at the gate.

When the opposition candidates did collect the required number of signatures, Moscow election authorities and then Pamfilova's Central Election Commission found a variety of flaws and denied them the registration.

Pamfilova, who has served as the presidential human rights ombudswoman, insisted there was nothing she could do to stop what blew over into a major political crisis.

She also said several candidates were reinstated upon appeal and that the competition at the City Duma election - about five candidates per seat - is high.

The most vocal government opponents, however, were not only barred from running but also ended up in jail for weeks for calling for unsanctioned protests.

The violations that kept the candidates from running included minor clerical mistakes or erroneous personal data that was entered by election officials.

Hundreds of voters including celebrities spoke out after their signatures were ruled to be forgeries.

Pamfilova insists that the commission looked into those reports, eventually reversing the decision on hundreds of signatures. But that didn't change things for the candidates: the new count still showed that they had too many invalid signatures.

Russia has adopted a plethora of legislation in the past decade, introducing various curbs to non-party-affiliated candidates seeking office, which was seen as an attempt to keep the opposition at bay.

Although standing firm on her decision to turn down the candidates, Pamfilova concedes that this summer's election campaign has highlighted the flaws in the election legislation and says that her commission will come up with amendments to streamline the signature collection for candidates and cut down the number of signatures required.

But Pamfilova's proposals would still leave room for genuine signatures to be discarded.

After the interview with the AP, Pamfilova pulled out a spreadsheet from a thick folder she compiled to show why the signatures collected by the opposition candidates were ruled invalid.

The voters' signatures on that sheet collected by one of the candidates could be genuine, she admitted, but because the entry date for each of the ten signatures is clearly written in by one person, the election authorities suspected they might be forgeries and therefore they could not be submitted.

When asked if the amendments could put back on the ballot candidates like Lyubov Sobol who was on hunger strike in protest for a month, Pamfilova was adamant.

She recalled her own political career - Pamfilova ran as an independent candidate for Russian president in 2000 when Putin was first elected - and said the opposition should toughen up and comply with the laws the way they are.

Sobol however rejected Pamfilova's suggestions that she called up the protests back in July because she could not collect enough signatures and dismissed the Central Election Commission chief as a "talking head" who merely toes the Kremlin line.

Authorities initially refused to give permission to opposition rallies when the protests erupted in July and dispatched a formidable police force to those impromptu weekend gatherings.

Riot police at the July 27 rally were beating up and brutally detaining hundreds of people who offered no resistance.

In an apparent attempt to ward off more protests, authorities arrested 14 people and charged them with rioting even though the July 27 rally did not see any property damage or violence.

Three out of the 14 detained men have worked for the opposition candidates collecting signatures.

They now face up to eight years in prison if convicted.

Pamfilova said she was not familiar with the circumstances of the case but said that she wishes that the arrested activists, aged 20 to 36, had spoken to her and got to the bottom of what was wrong with the signatures they collected instead of coming out to an unsanctioned protest.

Pamfilova accused several candidates including Sobol, an associate of opposition leader Alexei Navalny, of manipulating their supporters but conceded that the anger and frustration that Moscow has been seeing in the past weeks are genuine.

Sobol, who spearheaded the protests, rejects Pamfilova's suggestions that people should rally only with the government's permission.

Sobol and her allies have called on Muscovites to come out in support of the independent candidates on Saturday after authorities turned down the opposition's multiple requests for an authorised rally.