Parliamentary Elections, 27 February and 13 March 2005

In response to an invitation by Kyrgyzstan's Foreign Ministry, ODIHR deployed an election observation mission in mid-January to observe the 27 February parliamentary elections. A second round of voting on 13 March was observed on a more limited scale.

Headed by Ambassador Lubomir Kopaj of Slovakia, the mission included a 12-member core team based in Bishkek, as well as 18 long-term observers based in eight locations throughout Kyrgyzstan. For the first round of elections on 27 February, the mission was joined by 175 short-term observers. For the second round of elections, the mission maintained its core team and long-term observers, while election-day observation was conducted by 82 observers.

According to the mission's final report: "The 27 February 2005 and 13 March parliamentary elections in the Kyrgyz Republic, while more competitive than previous elections, fell short of OSCE commitments and other international standards for democratic elections in a number of important areas. The conduct of the second round of elections demonstrated some technical improvements over the first round, but significant shortcomings remained. The events which followed the second round of elections, and resulted in the departure and ultimately the resignation of President Akaev, are discussed in this report only to the extent that they relate to the election process."

The ODIHR mission co-operated with delegations from the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly and the European Parliament in observing these elections.

Previous elections

ODIHR observed parliamentary and presidential elections in Kyrgyzstan in February and October 2000, respectively.