OSCE SAYS BELARUSIAN ELECTIONS 'SIGNIFICANTLY SHORT' OF DEMOCRATIC STANDARDS...

OSCE Parliamentary Assembly Vice President Tone Tinsgaard, who led an OSCE short-term monitoring mission for the 17 October legislative ballot, said on 18 October that the elections fell "significantly short" of Belarus's OSCE commitments. The OSCE refused to monitor the presidential referendum held the same day, even though it was invited to do so by Minsk. According to Tinsgaard, the biased referendum campaign by the Belarusian government "contributed to a highly distorted campaign environment." Tinsgaard said the authorities raided the campaign offices of opposition candidates, coerced many groups of voters to cast ballots in the 17 October polls, and conducted biased coverage of election-relates issues in the media. OSCE monitors determined that in 60 percent of polling stations they visited the vote count lacked transparency and was practically uncontrollable.