Director of the OSCE/ODIHR Janez Lenarcic’s exclusive interview to Mediamax

- How would you characterize relations between Armenia and OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights? How is the dialogue is developing?

- ODIHR has enjoyed and continues to enjoy good co-operation with the authorities in Armenia, across a broad spectrum of activities and issues, and communication with them has been regular and productive. We have supported electoral processes through election observation missions, as well as through comments to electoral laws, in co-operation with the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission.

- During his speech at the European People's Party convention in Bucharest on October 17 Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said that “there is no need to say that this time again we expect active participation of the international observers”. Have you already received an Armenian side’s invitation to monitor the presidential election in 2013?

- ODIHR received an invitation from the Prime Minister to observe the presidential elections, in line with OSCE commitments, just after the elections were called, on 8 December.

- During the same speech Serzh Sargsyan stated that the authorities are determined to transform the progress registered in the Parliamentary elections into a firm trend and to hold free, fair, transparent and democratic presidential elections. He also added that “to achieve that we are conducting preliminary works stemming from the conclusions and proposals of the OSCE/ODIHR”. What is your accession of implementation of these recommendations and suggestions by Armenian authorities?

- In line with recommendations by the Venice Commission, it is accepted good practice not to make fundamental changes to the legal framework for elections less than a year before the vote. As such, there has been insufficient time since the parliamentary elections last year.

All election-associated practices will be assessed by the observation mission for the presidential vote, and ODIHR is ready to engage in substantive discussions of recommendation contained in the final reports from both the 2012 and 2013 elections after the presidential election. This would involve an inclusive process involving all major electoral stakeholders, including government authorities, political parties and candidates and representatives of civil society.

- Parliamentary oppositional forces have recently tried to call a special session of the National Assembly to discuss the issue of making amendments into the Electoral Code but the initiative was failed due to the position of the ruling Republican Party. The opposition stated that it demonstrated that the authorities weren't ready to hold free and fair elections. Are you familiar with the situation and what is the OSCE/ODIHR stance on this?

- As mentioned previously, it is good practice not to make fundamental changes to the legal framework for elections less than a year before the vote.  At the same time, the final report by the Election Observation Mission for the 2012 parliamentary elections identified a number of procedural issues that fall under the competencies of the Central Election Commission that could  be addressed before the presidential election in February.

- The OSCE/ODIHR report said that “the general lack of confidence among political parties and the general public in the integrity of the electoral process is an issue of great concern”. Have you noticed any progress in this direction since May’s Parliamentary elections?

- Although ODIHR itself has not made any assessment of the situation in Armenia since the release of its final report on the 2012 parliamentary elections, the Armenian Human Rights Ombudsman was recently quoted by the media as saying that “society did not trust the electoral process”.

- Are you going to visit Armenia to get acquainted with the pre-election processes on the spot?

- ODIHR’s methodology for the observation includes the sending of a Needs Assessment Mission to a country before its election to make a recommendation on what, if any, type of observation activity would offer the best added value in making recommendations to improve the holding of democratic elections. As the office sent such a mission to Armenia only recently – ahead of the 2012 parliamentary elections – it is unnecessary to send another mission in this case.

Based on the findings and conclusions of the OSCE/ODIHR election observation mission for the 2012 parliamentary elections, the office will send an Election Observation Mission for the presidential election, of a similar format to that for the parliamentary elections.

Our methodology involves the assessment of the entire electoral process, so the core team of election experts and long term observers would arrive in the country from six to eight weeks prior to election day.