Azerbaijani electoral laws have to be changed and amended, even though the presidential elections are not very soon- in 2008, the Council of Europe general management advisor on political matters, Plamen Nikolov announced during the round table discussions on April 28 in Baku, Trend reports.
Despite, the local government undertaken some steps to improve the situation since the last parliamentary elections in November 2005, electoral process is still far from CE standards.
Soon after the elections we have submitted recommendations to the Azerbaijani site, including requests to introduce changes in the electoral laws, Nikolov reminded.
Meanwhile, an International Fund on electoral systems (IFES) expert, Daniel Blessington reported about the modification processes of
electoral laws around the world, urging the Azerbaijani side to stick to these principles.
Both positive and negative moments have been registered during the last elections, he said. As positive moments he mentioned 2 presidential decrees to modify the electoral system and steping up the educational efforts among the population.
The very fact that the Central elections commission (CEC) rejected the voting results in 460 districts proves the existing violations. Special attention should be paid to electoral laws, he announced.
CE Venetian commission expert, Peter Paczolay said that after entering CE Azerbaijan did some positive changes into its laws, but there is still a great deal of work to be done.
On the other hand, MP, Samed Seyidov called November 6 elections as a step forward towards European integration. Simultaneously, the elections showed the existing demerits so we can analyze them to avoid in future, Seyidov said.