NGO members claim election of Azerbaijani President to be undemocratic

On February 12, the Election Monitoring and Democracy Studies Centre (EMDSC) released its statement in connection with the fact that the early presidential election were scheduled for April 11, the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent reports.

"Although the President's resolution to schedule the early election comply with the Constitution and the Election Code of Azerbaijan, the measure of scheduling still contradicts the principles of periodicity of elections and democratic constitutionalism," the EMDSC claims in its statement.

According to the experts of the Centre, "the resolution to schedule the early election did not contain any solid arguments to justify the political need for its holding, and it was signed without conducting open discussions in the Parliament." That made it difficult to all parties, including potential presidential candidates, as well as local and international observers, to get prepared for the election.

In its statement, the EMDSC regrets that "presence in Azerbaijan of more than 140 political prisoners, adoption in the country of measures restricting freedom of expression, including the blocking of several independent media websites, and mass persecution of social network activists on the Internet fail to provide a democratic atmosphere on the eve of the early presidential election."

EMDSC has reminded that the pressure on NGOs and human rights organizations is not stopped in the country and civil society is seriously limited in educating voters and organizing election monitoring.

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.