From the 25th to the 30th of October 7 Lithuanian observers sent by the Eastern Europe Studies Centre (EESC) will observe the Parliamentary elections in Ukraine, which will take place on the 28th of October. The EESC observers are part of a larger international civil society observation mission containing 50 participants, which is organised by the EESC, Stefan Batory Foundation (Poland) and European Exchange (Germany). The mission operates in Ukraine since September 17.
“These elections are very important for the development of the Ukrainian democracy. With the growing number of pre-electoral processes’ violations reported by the international observers, civil society fears that the elections may lack transparency”, – says Kristina Vaičiūnaitė, the Director of the EESC. “Free and fair elections are among the crucial indicators of the modern representative democracy.”
Since the beginning of October 3 long term observers sent by the EESC are observing the preparations for the elections. On the Election Day the electoral process, vote counting procedures, vote and announcement of the results will be observed.
In collaboration with the Polish and German partners the trainings for the Lithuanian short term observers will be organised, in which the participants will learn about the political situation in Ukraine, party and electoral systems, election procedures as well as the duties and rights of the election observers.
This is the 5th international election observation mission organised by the EESC and the first such a mission to Ukraine. Previously the EESC observed parliamentary elections of 2012 and 2008, presidential elections of 2010 and municipal elections of 2010 in Georgia.
The election observation mission is implemented in collaboration with the Embassy of the Republic of Lithuania in Ukraine.