Russia’s claims that the U.S. authorities have been hindering its election monitoring capacity are simply unfounded, Embassy press attache Maria Olson told Interfax.
Russia was invited to join OSCE short-term and long-term election observation missions. In addition, employees of the Russian Embassy in the United States, same as employees of all embassies of OSCE member countries in the U.S., have been offered to join the OSCE short-term election observation mission, Olson said.
Russia was also invited to participate in the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly election observation mission, but it did not delegate a single representative there, she said.
The U.S. Embassy received Russia’s election observation note on October 26, Olson said.
She also said that certain U.S. states and territories were receiving election observation requests from countries on their own.
If Russia has sent a request to the authorities of any state or territory of the kind, the decision is made by the local authorities, the press attache said.
Representatives of more than 30 OSCE member countries are expected to monitor the U.S. presidential elections, Olson said, citing tentative information.
U.S. representatives joined the election observation mission from over 20 OSCE member states in the State Duma elections in September 2016, she said.
