I’m a bit late in posting this, but it’s probably worth doing so as most people are waiting for the final conclusion to be drawn on the conduct of the May parliamentary election to come from the OSCE/ODIHR. Anyway, it’s available in English here, and in Armenian here, and I’m posting the Executive Summary below.

Candidate registration has taken place in an inclusive manner. All twenty-four parties and one bloc that applied for registration in the proportional contest were registered by the Central Election Commission (CEC) on 4 April. In the majoritarian contests, 135 candidates were registered by the 41 Territorial Election Commissions (TECs).

· Many of the registered contestants in the proportional contest have exceeded the legal requirement of 15 per cent representation of women on their list.

· The CEC is generally working efficiently, appears to be technically well equipped and prepared for coordinating results tabulation and reporting on election day, and is proactive in informing the electorate about voter list checking and election day procedures. TECs are similarly working efficiently. The police, responsible for the voter list, are making efforts to correct inaccuracies in the list.

· The official election campaign opened on 8 April. Campaigning is very visible in Yerevan, but less so outside the capital. Airtime on public TV and radio was allocated by a CEC lottery, with broadcasts beginning on 10 April.

· Four incidents of damage to property of parties and candidates, including explosive devices detonating at two Yerevan neighbourhood offices of the Prosperous Armenia party, are under police investigation.

· Following the death of Prime Minister Andranik Margaryan on 25 March, President Robert Kocharyan appointed Serge Sargsyan as prime minister on 4 April. The president appointed a new cabinet on 11 April, largely unchanged from the outgoing government.

Earlier reports and updates are available here.