{"id":1706,"date":"2015-09-11T16:35:21","date_gmt":"2015-09-11T16:35:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1706"},"modified":"2015-09-11T16:35:21","modified_gmt":"2015-09-11T16:35:21","slug":"restrictions-imposed-by-azerbaijan-compel-cancellation-of-parliamentary-election-observation-mission-says-odihr-director-link","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1706","title":{"rendered":"Restrictions imposed by Azerbaijan compel cancellation of parliamentary election observation mission, says ODIHR Director Link"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><em>Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODHIR)<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">WARSAW, 11 September 2015 \u2013 Michael Georg Link, Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), announced today that, due to restrictions imposed by the Azerbaijani authorities, ODIHR has no choice but to cancel its mission to observe the country\u2019s 1 November parliamentary elections.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_1707\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1707\" style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/covcasbulletin-info.hhd.am\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/OSCE-Michael-Link.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-1707\" src=\"https:\/\/covcasbulletin-info.hhd.am\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/OSCE-Michael-Link-300x162.jpg\" alt=\"Michael Georg Link, Director of ODIHR at the Opening session of the 21st OSCE Ministerial Council in Basel, 4 December 2014. (OSCE\/FDFA\/B\u00e9atrice Dev\u00e8nes)\" width=\"300\" height=\"162\" srcset=\"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/OSCE-Michael-Link-300x162.jpg 300w, https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/09\/OSCE-Michael-Link.jpg 940w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1707\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Michael Georg Link, Director of ODIHR at the Opening session of the 21st OSCE Ministerial Council in Basel, 4 December 2014. (OSCE\/FDFA\/B\u00e9atrice Dev\u00e8nes)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cThe restriction on the number of observers taking part would make it impossible for the mission to carry out effective and credible election observation,\u201d the ODIHR Director said. \u201cRegretfully, we are compelled by these actions to cancel the deployment of ODIHR\u2019s observation mission for the parliamentary elections.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cThe Azerbaijani authorities\u2019 insistence on a restricted number of observers is directly counter to the country\u2019s OSCE commitments and in contradiction to ODIHR\u2019s election observation mandate,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Azerbaijan, as all OSCE participating States, has committed to inviting international observers for its elections, as well as to ensuring utmost attention to the independence, impartiality and professionalism of ODIHR election observation. Following the receipt of an invitation from the Azerbaijani authorities, an <a href=\"http:\/\/www.osce.org\/odihr\/elections\/azerbaijan\/179216?download=true\" target=\"_blank\">ODIHR needs assessment mission<\/a> sent to the country recommended the deployment of an election observation mission, including a core team of experts, 30 long-term observers and 350 short-term observers.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">In a 31 August communication, Azerbaijan\u2019s Permanent Mission to the OSCE stated that the authorities were ready to accept only 6 long-term and up to 125 short-term ODIHR observers. The decision to cancel the deployment was only taken after a further communication, received late yesterday from the Azerbaijani Permanent Mission, reiterated these limitations.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Within its mandate, ODIHR remains ready to provide assistance to Azerbaijan in the implementation of its election-related and other OSCE human dimension commitments, Director Link underlined.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODHIR) WARSAW, 11 September 2015 \u2013 Michael Georg Link, Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and <a class=\"mh-excerpt-more\" href=\"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/?p=1706\" title=\"Restrictions imposed by Azerbaijan compel cancellation of parliamentary election observation mission, says ODIHR Director Link\">[more &gt;&gt;&gt;]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1707,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-azerbaijan","category-azerbaijan-human-rights"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1706"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1706\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1708,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1706\/revisions\/1708"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/covcasbulletin.info\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}