OSCE and EP refuse to monitor Azerbaijan’s upcoming parliamentary elections, amid opposition boycott

On the 1st of November parliamentary elections will be held in Azerbaijan. Voters will elect, in 125 electoral districts, 125 deputies for a five year term in the unicameral parliament, the Milli Majilis. 1246 candidates were registered by the Central Election Commission (CEC), but 477 of them withdrew their candidacy, leaving 769 candidates to run in the elections. President Ilham Aliyev’s New Azerbaijan Party (YAP) is expected to win a majority of the seats, leading some opposition parties to boycott the elections. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), as well as the European Parliament (EP) have refused to monitor the elections as the repressive regime makes it “impossible for the mission to carry out effective and credible election observation”.