Europe's leading democratic watchdog has cancelled plans to send observers to Russia for the presidential elections after accusing the Kremlin of imposing unacceptable conditions on its work.

Russia reacted furiously after the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) announced that it would boycott the vote on March 2, which Vladimir Putin's anointed successor, Dmitri Medvedev, is certain to win.

The organisation had complained of “unprecedented restrictions” imposed by Moscow on observers from its elections division, the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights. Russia's Central Election Commission had limited the team to only 70 members, compared with more than 400 at the last presidential election in 2004, and had banned them from entering the country until February 28, two days before polling began.

After protests, the election commission offered to admit a small advance team of technical experts this week but said that the rest would not be allowed to enter until February 20. The OSCE elections groups said that all of its monitors had to be in place by February 15 as an “absolute minimum” to ensure that the election campaign could be assessed properly.

Christian Strohal, the head of the division, said: “The time frame set by Russian authorities has already prevented us from observing many important parts of the election process, beginning with the registration of candidates and aspects of the campaign, including the work of the media. What is true for every election is also true for this one: transparency strengthens democracy; politics behind closed doors weakens it.”

Russia is alone in the OSCE in attempting to restrict the work of international monitors. It has set a limit of 400 in total, including observers from former Soviet republics in the Commonwealth of Independent States, who usually give a seal of approval to anything the authorities do.

Times Recommends

• No apology for Germany’s own Nazi victims
• Intricate web of fear and hope tying down deal
• Victims remembered a year after Mumbai attacks