You're reading: CIS observers: Parliamentary elections in Belarus held according to democratic norms

Minsk - The CIS observer mission found the recent parliamentary elections in Belarus to be in compliance with the universally accepted democratic norms and the national legislation.

“The CIS observer mission has come to the conclusion that the September 23, 2012 elections were conducted in accordance with the Constitution and the Election Code of Belarus. The elections complied with the universally accepted democratic norms and were transparent and public,” the observer mission said in its official statement posted on the website of the CIS Executive Committee.

The mission believes the candidates had equal legal conditions and fulfilled the same registration requirements.

“Meetings were conducted in an organized way in the presence of international and national observers, and members of commissions behaved correctly towards the candidates. The candidates who were denied registration were told they had a right to file complaints with the Central Commission. Fifty-six of 122 people used that opportunity,” the CIS observer mission said in its statement.

The candidates had equal conditions for election campaigning, the document says.

“While pointing out the generally calm election campaign, the mission states that some violations of order occurred during the election campaign. In some election districts, cases of election campaigning materials being damaged and destroyed were registered. According to the Interior Ministry, there were cases when printed election campaigning materials being published without a dateline or with incomplete datelines,” the document says.

“The CIS observers state that the complaints about violations occurring during the election campaign were considered in accordance with the legislation of the republic of Belarus.”

“The Prosecutor General’s Office of the Republic of Belarus has reported that prosecutors have received 79 complaints about the observance of the electoral legislation. Decisions have been made on all those complaints. No criminal cases have been opened on the basis of those violations,” the statement says.

The Central Elections Commission has received 477 complaints from citizens, of which 83 were unrelated to the elections. All complaints were considered within the period of time established by the law, the document says.

“At the same time, CIS observers have registered some violations. Specifically, there was an incident when a whole family was in the ballot space and an incident when an early voting protocol was not posted on the information stand in the voting room,” the document says.

“Representatives of the mission observed the ballot counting procedures and found that this procedure was conducted openly. The observers had a real opportunity to observe the procedure within their line of vision,” the statement says.

The CIS observer mission states that “the election campaign in the Republic of Belarus took place in an organized and calm atmosphere. The authorities and the elections commissions of all levels ensured the exercise of the electoral rights of the country’s citizens.”

The Belarusian parliamentary elections were monitored by 385 CIS observers.