Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's ruling party suffered a big decline in Russia's parliamentary election, winning less than half of votes cast, according to the two biggest exit polls published after voting closed.
According to the poll from state pollster VTsIOM, Putin's United Russia party won 48.5% of the vote followed by the Communists with 19.8%, LDPR with 11.4% and Just Russia with 12.8%.
An exit poll by FOM shown on state television showed United Russia won 46%, a result which the pollster projected would give the party just 220 of the 450 State Duma seats, far below the 315 seats it won in the last election in 2007.
Voting took place against the backdrop of allegations of violations of election law with more than 5,000 complaints having been logged by Russia's only independent monitoring group, Golos.
The leader of the monitoring group Golos, Lilya Shibanova, was detained for 12 hours at a Moscow airport as she arrived for the poll.
On Friday, the organisation was fined for allegedly violating election law.
Seven parties, including Mr Putin's ruling United Russia, ran in the elections to the lower house of parliament.
It is seen as a dry run of presidential polls in March in which current Prime Minister Putin is expected to win back his old job.
Sites 'hacked'
Meanwhile, two liberal Russian media outlets and an election monitoring group said their sites had been shut down by hackers intent on silencing them over allegations of violations.
One publication accused state bodies of interference.
Sites belonging to the Ekho Moskvy radio station, online news portal Slon.ru and the Western-financed watchdog Golos went down at around 4am (Irish time).
"There is the feeling that the Central Election Commission, the prosecutors and the hackers are acting together," Maxim Kashulinsky, general director of Slon.ru said.
Neither the general prosecutor's office nor the Central Election Commission could be reached for comment.
Mr Kashulinsky said the news portal was targeted because it supported a Golos project.
