Sweden's prime minister has denied a report claiming that an adviser in his country's Moscow embassy met with opposition activists ahead of Sunday's State Duma elections to plan large-scale nationwide protests.
"There are no grounds for it," Fredrik Reinfeldt Radio Sweden on Monday afternoon in response to the report by NTV state television on Friday.
Reinfeldt suggested that Russian authorities "tried to cast doubt on the work of foreign offices," as "part of election campaigning," which showed their "growing nervousness as they waited for the election results."
The claim was made in a that aired Friday evening on the Gazprom-controlled television channel, decrying Golos, Russia's only independent elections watchdog, as a subversive agent of foreign governments.
In the report a narrator said the Swedish Embassy official met with students, opposition activists and bloggers, including prominent Anton Nosik.
Nosik laughed off the accusations on his blog last week, while Golos has promised to the channel.
NTV reporters barged into Golos offices in late November to question them on camera about whether they were financed from abroad.