Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-10-26-Speech-3-311"
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"en.20051026.21.3-311"2
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".
Madam President, Azerbaijan is one the European Union’s key partners in the Southern Caucasus region, principally due to its geostrategic location and energy resources. Last year we therefore proposed to the Council that Azerbaijan, together with Armenia and Georgia, be included in the European Neighbourhood Policy in order to further strengthen our relations, building on the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement in force since July 1999.
Whilst on the one hand commending Azerbaijan for this progress, we agree with OSCE-ODIHR that it might not be sufficient. The worrying deterioration in the climate of the electoral campaign over the last few days threatens to completely overshadow this limited progress.
We will continue to monitor the situation very closely throughout the electoral campaign, on the day of the election and in the aftermath on 6 November. In accordance with our well-established practice, we will not deploy a separate Election Observation Mission; as with the OSCE countries, support will be given to the OSCE office and the ODIHR office which will take on that task.
As we have stressed several times recently, these elections will be a litmus test for Azerbaijan and its aspirations to come closer to the European Union in the framework of the European Neighbourhood Policy. On the question of the Neighbourhood Policy, I can only say that we will start consulting on the action plans in the near future. We hope that we might be able to work out satisfactory action plans by next year.
The Commission has been following the preparations for the parliamentary elections of 6 November 2005 with great attention and some concern.
The events last week, such a short time before the elections, are a source of further concern. Some Azeri Government ministers were dismissed by President Ilham Aliyev and subsequently arrested on charges ranging from corruption and embezzlement of state funds to an attempt to stage a coup d’état.
We cannot make any judgement on these accusations, nor are we willing to interfere with the decisions to be taken by the Azerbaijani judiciary. However, we wish to point out that it will be crucial for Azerbaijan to carry out, in a very transparent way, fair and thorough investigations and, if necessary, a balanced trial in order to establish the truth.
The arrests are inevitably contributing to a worrying deterioration in the atmosphere of the electoral campaign. Unfortunately the campaign has already been marked by several episodes of violence and some specific incidents.
As a consequence of this climate, we have learnt of dozens of candidates who have withdrawn in the last hours. Access to State and public TV is no longer being granted to opposition parties, or it is subject to so many restrictions that it cannot be considered satisfactory.
In all the contacts the Commission has had recently with the Azeri authorities, we have strongly insisted on respect for fundamental freedoms, including, of course, freedom of expression and the possibility for political parties to hold public rallies without undue restrictions and to access mass media. We have also stressed several times, to opposition representatives as well, the need for such rights to be exercised in a moderate and peaceful way.
We fully concur with the assessment of the electoral campaign by the OSCE-ODIHR in the two interim reports published so far. It cannot be denied that some progress has been made compared with the parliamentary elections of 2000 and the presidential elections of 2003. More candidates than ever were registered; state authorities have proved cooperative with international observers; all parties have been granted some access to television.
Finally, we welcome the decision by the Azeri authorities to introduce systems such as finger-inking that could dramatically reduce the possibility of multiple voting, although this came very late."@en1
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