6 November and re-election in Azerbaijan to be discussed at the winter session of PACE

He also stated that, the cooperation between the Venice Commission and Azerbaijan can be restored after the winter session of the Parliamentary Assembly of Council of Europe (PACE) due on 23-27 January: ”PACE or one of its committees can send us an inquiry on continuing the cooperation with Azerbaijan and draw up a report as the result of the cooperation after the winter session”, ANS reports.

Sergei Kuznetsov considers that the government of Azerbaijan can send this inquiry, as well: ”We have experienced such case that the government of a country applied to us for carrying on cooperation after the session. It is not necessary for PACE to impose any sanction on that country for this, holding of discussions sometimes impacts the reassessment of the authorities some issues”. Reminding that, no illegalities were observed in the polling stations where the laws and the Election Code were obeyed in the 6 November parliamentary elections and election frauds were observed in the stations where the legislation was violated, Mr. Kuznetsov underlined that the VC has not prepared any recommendations concerning the re-elections scheduled for 13 May: ”The re-elections are conducted on the basis of the procedures applied in the initial elections. The requirements adopted under the President’s decree “Urgent measures on preparation to the parliamentary elections” issued in accordance with our recommendations will be applied in the re-elections too”. The representative of the VC refused to express opinion on the process of forming the composition of the Central Election Commission. He explained it by the fact that no talks are held between the commission and Azerbaijan at present.