What Violations Were Recorded at the Polling Stations: Daniel Ioannisyan

Starting from 7 AM, "Independent Observer" has been monitoring the ongoing municipal elections in Yerevan with a team of 170, and several issues have already been recorded. This was stated today, September 17, during a press conference by Daniel Ioannisyan, a representative of the "Independent Observer" civic alliance and program coordinator of the "Informed Citizens' Union," who presented their interim observation results.

"In particular, the process at 4 polling stations started 20 minutes late, and at 2-21 polling stations, it started more than an hour late due to the absence of the commission chairperson. Many polling stations are located in very inconvenient places, and four of them are in basement floors. Essentially, a total of 48 violations were recorded, of which 4 were by the commission chairperson, 21 by authorized persons, 21 by voters, and the remaining ones by unknown individuals. Most of the violations were by the ruling Civil Contract party, but there were also violations recorded by the 'Living Country', 'National Progress', 'Force of the Fatherland', 'Public Voice', 'Republic', and 'Mother Armenia' political forces," he said.

Ioannisyan noted that our observers recorded guidance in 7 precinct electoral commissions, of which 4 (6/13, 9/56, 9/57, and 9/6) were repeated frequently by representatives of the Civil Contract party. The other cases involved parties like 'Living Country' and 'Bright Armenia'.

Congestion was observed at 18 polling stations, with 4 of them experiencing periodic issues. At one polling station, more than 3 entries of the 'Public Voice' party were recorded, which is prohibited. Cases related to the violation of voting secrecy were recorded at 20 polling stations, some of which were due to incorrect setup. There were 30 cases of procedural violations," Ioannisyan added.

He further emphasized that there are issues regarding the accessibility of the CEC's website, which is either restricted or unavailable due to technical difficulties. "Between 07:56 and 08:01, video monitoring opportunities were severely limited; it has been arranged so that only one camera can be monitored from one IP. This means that if one provider gives internet through one IP to an entire building, if someone is monitoring one precinct from that building, no other person can monitor the course of another precinct from that same building. Now it has opened up, and it is possible to monitor more," said the representative of the "Independent Observer".