Mazahir Panahov: CEC of Azerbaijan always cooperates with the Russian Central Electoral Commission

The Azerbaijani CEC has been actively cooperating with the Russian Central Electoral Commission for many years, and the communication happens regularly, the CEC Chairman Mazahir Panahov noted in an interview with a correspondent of Vestnik Kavkaza on the sidelines of a meeting with Russian journalists held today at the Central Electoral Commission, and confirmed that the delegation of the Russian Central Election Commission is to arrive in Baku soon.

"In principle, we have maintained very close relations during many years. The current elections are another reason for communication. We always discuss our actions on almost all issues. So during the upcoming meeting we can look more specifically at the strategy of the elections,’’ he said.

"In any case, we should discuss it and share the latest news. In this regard, our ties have a regular basis. We organize phone conferencing every month or two. At the moment, the current electoral commission of Azerbaijan fully supports our pro-Russian and Russian colleagues,’’ Panahov added. 

"In general, the whole post-Soviet space communicates very well,’’ he added.

The CEC chairman also said that a fairly representative delegation of Russian observers is to visit Azerbaijan. The Azerbaijani CEC is not planning to create any special conditions for them, because such conditions exist in Azerbaijan constantly.

"There is no need to create for the Russian delegation any special conditions, because they are traditionally very well here. 21 Russian representatives of the Interparliamentary Assembly, as well as 118 observers from the CIS are to pay visits to Azerbaijan. A delegation of Russian journalists are already in Azerbaijan now. The delegation consists of 170 people. This is quite an impressive number of people," he said.

"The chairman of the CEC of Russia Vladimir Churov is to arrive in our place together with his team. They are among these 170 people I mentioned before. We had a conversation with him and came to the conclusion that he’d better have his own team. We were very happy to hear that," Panahov said. 

"During the past elections, observers from Europe also had good results, but this figure reduced a little bit. But if you take into account such a fact as geography, it is still quite impressive," the head of the Azerbaijani Central Electoral Commission noted.