The head of the election monitoring group, Grigory Melkonyants, is being kept in prison until mid-April next year, accused of cooperating with an "undesirable organization." The court extended his pre-trial detention by three months. Golos, labeled "a foreign agent" by the justice ministry, has deployed observers at polling stations and documented electoral abuses. Allies of Melkonyants accuse the authorities of unjustly detaining him to avoid election scrutiny. The Kremlin denies interfering in court cases.