A man in the Bryansk region has been detained on suspicion of stealing two web cameras that were installed at a polling site as part of the government's effort to prevent vote theft in the upcoming presidential vote, police said Tuesday.
An unnamed suspect broke into a cultural building in the Bryansk region village of Sachkovichi on Sunday and stole two Logitech web cameras and one Lenovo laptop computer meant to provide a live feed of the polling site during the March 4 presidential election, police said in a statement Tuesday. The building was not being protected by a security guard.
Presidential candidate Vladimir Putin initiated the project to equip thousands of polling sites across Russia with web cameras in response to opposition complaints about falsifications during December's State Duma elections.
Last week, Rostelecom announced that 15,000 sets of cameras had been installed so far. A total of 91,400 polling sites will be equipped with cameras, at a cost of up to 30 billion rubles ($1 billion), with the government paying 13 billion rubles and the rest to be paid by state-run Rostelecom.
