Breakaway Abkhazia is holding parliamentary elections on March 4, less than a month after local self-governance elections.

A total of 108 candidates will be running for 35 seats in the Abkhaz Parliament. According to the Abkhaz Central Election Commission there are a total of 129 650 eligible voters.

Elections are held based on the majoritarian system in 35 single-mandate constituencies; three out of this number are located in the Georgian-populated Gali District. Reportedly, there are total of eleven candidates running in these three constituencies of the Gali District, eight of whom are ethnic Georgians.

Candidates from political groups that are allied with Abkhaz leader Sergey Bagapsh, including Amtsakhara, Aitaira (Revival) and United Abkhazia, will be challenged during the elections by candidates from the opposition Forum of Abkhaz People’s Unity, uniting supporters of Vice-President Raul Khajimba and former Abkhaz leader Vladislav Ardzinba. Khajimba was Bagapsh's rival in the 2004 presidential elections and came to power as a result of a power-sharing agreement with Bagapsh.

Abkhaz leader Sergey Bagapsh said after casting his ballot in Sokhumi on March 4 that these elections confirm that Abkhazia “is a democratic state with all of its components.”

On March 3 he told reporters that he was planning to visit the Gali District of Abkhazia on election day, as he did on February 11 when local elections were held in the breakaway region.

Bagapsh said that the Georgian authorities are stirring tensions in the Gali District with an aim to hinder the integration of the local Georgian population into Abkhaz society.

“But residents of the Gali District are integrating into the life of our Republic,” Abkhaz news agency Apsnipress quoted Bagapsh as saying at a news conference on March 3.

Tbilisi denounces the elections as illegal, a position shared by most of the international community.

But Moscow is expected to have a similar reaction as it did to February's local elections, which the Russian Foreign Ministry said “mainly corresponded to international electoral and democratic norms.”

The Georgian side has accused Sokhumi of mounting pressure on local Georgians in Gali to participate in the elections. Sokhumi denies the allegations.

The Abkhaz side said that voter turnout in the Gali District was high during the February 11 local elections, while officials in Tbilisi said that local Georgians in Gali boycotted the polls. No independent confirmation of either report was available. The situation is expected to be repeated in the March 4 parliamentary elections.