OSCE special mission of the Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) published its report on December 13 about presidential elections in Armenia.
It is noted in the report that the presidential elections in 2008 will be an important index to find out the further development of democratic process, the intentions of which were visible in the parliamentary elections of May 12, 2007.
It is spoken about the latest amedments in the «Elecoral Code», and it is noted that several interlocutors of the mission have considered it «cosmetic» and not essential, and they also expressed their distrust that the amendments will be effective to hold democratic elections. Few of them have noted that the use of finger print and to print the ballots in a foreign country will be very useful to avoid of multi voting. We may guess who has made that proposal since the mission members have met with head of office of Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s nomination civil initiatives Alexander Arzumanyan.
“The media access is still urgent for the opposition»,- is noted in the report and said that OSCE/ODIHR mission\’s interlocutors have told that before the official campaign is launched on January 21, 2008, the media access is too limited, and certain oppositionists are sentenced to information blockade. The incident with «Gala» TV Company is also noted in this report. But NCTR chairman Grigor Amalyan and H1 executive director Armen Arzumanyan have denied thse accusations and assured that equal opportunities will be given to the candiadtes after their registration: « In particular H1 promised to achieve its role as a public TV Company and cover the presidental campaign in details, including all possible debates among the candidates».
According to the report, a lot of interlocutors of the mission have noted that the public confidnce in the fairness of electoral process in Armenia is still very low, they have also reminded about the cases of multi voting, buying votes, false passports. They have expressed their doubt that the practice of negative influence of businessmen, buying votes and using te administrative resource will be used during the presiential elections as well. «Anyway there is no detailed information or proving documents to ground such affirmations.
Besides the OSCE/ODIHR mission has received the authorities confirmation that the upcoming lections will be well organized and more improved.»
It is also noted that the OSCE/ODIHR long-term monitoring will be launched from the beginning of January and 24 long-term observers will arrive in Armenia. And 250 short-term OSCE/ODIHR observers will follow the voting process.