Sobyanin has definitively declined to take part in the election debates.
Moscow. August 10. INTERFAX.RU — Moscow mayoral candidate Sergei Sobyanin has decided not to take part in the pre-election TV and radio debates, the head of the candidate’s public campaign headquarters, Lyudmila Shvetsova, told reporters on Saturday. “At this point, all questions can be put to rest, and it can be said that Moscow mayoral candidate S. Sobyanin will not participate in the debates, but will instead focus on his campaign work, on direct communication with Muscovites and voters,” she said. According to L. Shvetsova, S. Sobyanin consulted with his campaign headquarters before making the decision. “Sergei Semyonovich asked for the headquarters’ opinion, and we gave him our view with reasoned arguments, laying out the pros and cons. We expressed our wish that he not take part in the debates. He accepted our point of view and agreed with it,” she said. http://www.interfax.ru/news.asp?id=322805
from here Nothing surprising. It is the same attitude of contempt toward elections, Muscovites, and voters that Sobyanin himself and his party, United Russia, have demonstrated before.