Observers from the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly of the CIS (CIS IPA) are monitoring the voting process in Belarus’ presidential elections.
CIS IPA’s press center says the observer group members include MPs from Tajikistan: Dislhod Rahmon, the Chairperson of the Majlisi Milli (Tajikistan’s upper chamber of parliament) Committee on Ensuring Constitutional Foundations, Human and Civil Rights and Freedoms, and Legality, and Abdukhalil Ghafourzoda, the Deputy Secretary-General of the CIS Inter-Parliamentary Assembly Council also the Authorized Representative of Tajikistan’s Parliament to the CIS IPA.
The coordinator of the group is Konstantin Kosachev, Deputy Chairperson of the Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation.
Additionally, the group includes deputies and senators from CIS countries, officials from the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly, and experts from the International Institute for the Development of Democracy under the CIS IPA.
Before the elections, observers are scheduled to meet with the heads of the chambers of the Belarusian parliament, the leadership of election administration bodies, candidates, and their authorized representatives.
On January 26, observers from the CIS IPA will visit polling stations in Minsk and across all other regions of the republic.
The presidential elections in Belarus will take place on January 26, with early voting having begun on January 21.
Earlier, the country’s Central Election Commission registered five presidential candidates: the incumbent president, Alexander Lukashenko; the leader of the Liberal Democratic Party of Belarus, Oleg Gaidukevich; the leader of the Republican Party of Labor and Justice, Alexander Khizhnyak; the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party, Sergey Syrankov; and Anna Kanopatskaya, an entrepreneur and independent candidate who previously ran in the last election.
