On Sunday, voters in the world’s biggest country will go to the polls to elect a new parliament. The Russian parliament has invited international observers to monitor the election process and to learn lessons from it afterwards. I have been asked to lead the observers from the Council of Europe, which is both an honour and quite a chore.

The Council of Europe usually sends a pre-election delegation ahead of an observer mission. So I was in Moscow earlier this month to be briefed about the election process. During the week, I met leaders from all the political parties fielding candidates, both from the four parties currently in the Duma, and the three parties hoping to enter parliament.

Complex requirements
We also spoke with representatives of the parties that are not allowed to field candidates, because the authorities say they have not met registration requirements. They say the requirements are very complex and some thought they even prevented newcomers from participating.

In addition to the 40 Council of Europe observers, other international observers have been invited to Russia by the Duma. The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe is playing a key role. It is sending 160 short-term observers to Russia, a month ago 40 long-term observers were deployed to different parts of the country.

I met the special OSCE ambassador in early November to make sure cooperation between the organisations went smoothly. The idea is to give a joint press conference in Moscow every day, attended by the chairperson of the Parliamentary Assembly of the OSCE, who has been appointed leader of the short-term observer mission.

Münninghoff
This week, the final accreditations were issued to the international organisations. All 40 members of my delegation were allowed to participate, although there had been a complaint initially by the president of the electoral council against 'elements' of my pre-election delegation. The rule is that if one observer from the Council of Europe is not allowed in, the whole mission is cancelled. The OSCE does things differently: one of the Dutch delegates, Alexander Münninghoff, was rejected as long-term observer. The organisation accepted the decision.

Even though the Council of Europe deploys several observer missions per year, each one is special. The specific circumstances in a country play an important role in determining in how far the elections meet the requirements, set by the Council of Europe – and which members themselves have signed up to. The idea is to evaluate the electoral process objectively and improve it where necessary in consultation with the parliament in question. For this purpose, I will present an extensive report with observations and recommendations to the parliamentary assembly on behalf of the Council of Europe on 23 January.

Silence
Observers use their eyes and ears – and they ask questions. But they only start evaluating when the polling stations have closed. That’s important. Silence in that sense is an art and an obligation. Because elections are and remain a matter between the citizens of a country and their politicians. Ultimately, they determine how an election process goes and how to improve it in the future.

Tiny Kox (1953) is chairperson of het SP parliamentary party in the Upper House. He is deputy chair of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, an organisation which 47 countries are members of including Russia. The organisation endeavours to improve human rights and democracy.

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