Strasbourg, October 1st : This session was fully highlighted by the decision through vote to be taken by the Bureau, and to be endorsed by the Plenary Chamber, on the proposal to possibly review or to confirm the election observation mission of upcoming 1st November parliamentary elections in Azerbaijan.

Other very important events took place, such as election within EPP-group of future chairman of PACE, election of new Socialist leader, and last but not least, election of Secretary-General of the Assembly.

Directly related to occupied Nagorno-Karabakh, statements were made in two PACE committees, and reports are announced.

In chronological order, the overview of a very tense and important week:

1) Monday 28 September at 08:00, Bureau meeting, point 7 : Election observation of 1st November parliamentary elections in Azerbaijan, “to review the situation in the light of the decision of ODIHR not to observe these elections”.

This was third time that Chairperson Anne Brasseur and Secretary-General Sawicki put the election observation mission to Azerbaijan “to be reviewed” on the Bureau agenda. Since several weeks it was crystal clear that they are part of corporate forces who intend to cancel all election observation missions, in order to undermine and isolate Azerbaijan in the international community.
After decision by European Parliament, OSCE/ODIHR, and OSCE Parliamentary Assembly to cancel all election observation missions, leaders of these organizations all urged PACE to do the same, so Azerbaijan would become fully isolated and upcoming elections would lose all credibility. Pressure on all PACE stakeholders was tremendous to follow examples by other European institutions.

OSCE/ODIHR which is an office with civil servants played major role in this dirty geopolitical game. They are not controlled by any elected representatives, but they are an office with very particular private political agenda. That’s why ODIHR during recent years had so many conflicts with all other international organizations. Also this time requests by OSCE/ODIHR towards Azeri authorities were so preposterous, that one can only conclude their proposals were meant never to be accepted. Once OSCE Director Linck decided – and this happened very fast – to cancel their observation mission, the road was open to pressure all other organizations to do the same. Most observers expected that – beyond any doubt – PACE would follow the ODIHR position, so not any international organization would be present in the field during election day, 1st November.

This explains the very high importance of the PACE Bureau decision towards Azerbaijan. Would Bureau members give up their autonomy and follow ODIHR’s civil servants, or would they stand strong and defend their organization? Eventually wisdom prevailed, and the crucial vote in Bureau was won by 17 against 10 votes, as indeed many arguments were raised justifying this election observation mission by PACE. I would like to stress that the members of Presidential Committee, except Mr. Gross, voted in favor of the election observation mission.

A PACE pre-electoral mission, headed by Mr Xucla (ALDE) already came to the same conclusions, and this was well communicated by the rapporteurs Mr. Condé (EPP) and Mr. Tadeusz Iwinski (SOC) to all Bureau members.
During that pre-electoral mission in Baku (21-22 September), the representative of the Secretary-General of the Council of Europe, Head of the Council of Europe Baku Office, stressed that progress was made since last parliamentary elections five years ago, and the country should not be isolated. The Head of Office therefore urged, notwithstanding the earlier negative decision by OSCE/ODIHR, to ensure the presence of a strong PACE EOM during upcoming 1st November parliamentary elections.
Exactly same standpoint was clearly voiced by all western diplomats, so-called independent interlocutors, as they also urged PACE, for many and various reasons, not to cancel the EOM to Azerbaijan.
Even more important, during round table meeting in Baku with a large number of local NGO’s, human rights defenders and civil society activists, all interlocutors called unanimously for having this election observation mission by PACE.
Both co-rapporteurs from the Monitoring Committee, Mr Condé and Mr Iwinski stressed most important argument: observation of elections in “a member state under monitoring” is an official PART OF MONITORING PROCEDURE, which cannot just be ignored.

PACE decided – after many years – to have an election observation mission in Belarus this year. How can one explain to have an EOM in Belarus – non-member state, and not to have it in a genuine full member state of PACE?
If it is only because ODIHR is sending an EOM to Belarus, is this the new PACE standard? Co-rapporteurs very rightly presumed that PACE does not want to be perceived as an affiliated branch of ODIHR, at the very moment that PACE tries to emphasize the importance of the organization within the international community…
There is even a precedent. At 2nd March 2008 presidential elections in Russian Federation, the PACE-mission was the only official Western observation mission present…. (no ODIHR, no OSCE-PA, no EP). Chairman of then PACE EOM was Mr. Andreas Gross (SOC), Switzerland, who headed a successful PACE observation mission.
The plenary chamber discussed and voted very recently in June – within the last Monitoring Committee report – the possibility that other observation teams could cancel their EOM to Azerbaijan. The Plenary Chamber adopted with large majority the amendment nr. 4 tabled by EC-group members that PACE should increase the number of its mission, if other international organizations refuse to observe the elections. On the other hand, Plenary Chamber rejected with large majority amendment nr. 10 providing in such case – referring specifically to ODIHR – to review the EOM.

It was strange to notice that Presidential Committee decided to table this matter once more on Bureau’s agenda, thus going against and suggesting to overrule Plenary Chamber’s recent clear decisions. For sure this was not good political practice by PACE chairperson and secretary-general!

Co-rapporteurs also argued that final report of the PACE electoral observation mission is a necessary tool for the Assembly, both as basis for political debate on the conduct of these elections, and for keeping the institutional dialogue with the parliament of this member state. They stressed that it could be easily used against PACE that invitation to have an EOM was refused, as it was not Azerbaijan who opposed PACE to have their EOM.

Eventually, Bureau followed the arguments by co-rapporteurs and confirmed the election observation mission.

During her opening speech as president of PACE at 11:00, Mme Brasseur nevertheless once again heavily attacked Azerbaijan, and criticized, thus disagreed, the Bureau’s decision. Under normal circumstance a chairman in such situation would resign from office. For some dark reason she is really obsessed by our country, but fortunately this was her final speech as her mandate now expires.

In the afternoon, at the end of discussion on Progress Report, this Bureau decision was not challenged anymore, it was officially endorsed by the Plenary Chamber and is now final.

This was a great achievement for Azerbaijan, as total isolation could be prevented and foreign corporate interests trying to harm our country could be stopped.

2) Election in EPP group of new PACE chairman 2016-2017

On June 30th this year it appeared that EPP-group is most important political group in PACE, giving them the right to present next PACE chairman. This was agreed between political group leaders.

Mr Agramunt, Chair of EPP group, was obvious candidate for this mandate. But some weeks ago he was unexpectedly challenged by Mr Mignon (France), who was PACE chair before. Mr Mignon made a big campaign, showing victorious attitude.

But after voting in the EPP-group on Monday, results were crystal clear showing tremendous victory by 75 against 30 in favor of Mr Agramunt.

3) Election of new chairman of Socialist group

After many years of monopolizing the chair of Socialist Group by Mr Gross (Switzerland), finally there comes an end to his political career and a new leader needed to be appointed. It will make a huge difference to Azerbaijan not to have Mr Gross anymore in the cockpit of PACE, as – same as Mme Brasseur – he was continuously obsessed by Azerbaijan, using lie and slander to poison the debate and to attack the reputation of our country. Finally a new wind will blow in the meeting room of socialist group, now new chairman Mr Nicoletti from Italy was appointed.

4) Election of PACE Secretary General
The elections of CoE Secretary General was very tense. There were 2 candidates to this position: Serbian MP Ms. Svetislava Bulajić and Mr. Wojciech Sawicki.
As a consequence of propaganda against Russia, Ms. Bulajić lost the vote with 140/108. This result is very poor for Mr. Sawicki, who was PACE Secretary General for 5 years and regularly contacted MPs. Anti-Russian publicicts falsified the truth (in fact Ms. Bulajić was one of activists against Miloshevic government), presenting Ms. Bulajić as pro-Russian MP and broadly campaiging against her.
Mr. Sawicki was particularly distinguished during Ms. Anne Brasseur’s election to PACE Presidency. President Ms. Brasseur repaid her moral debt to Mr. Sawicki, by calling on ALDE members to support Mr. Sawicki prior to the elections, as former ALDE leader. Consequently, votes of ALDE members saved Mr. Sawicki from defeat.
5) Debates on Nagorno-Karabakh in two PACE committees

On Tuesday at 14:00, rapporteur Mr Walter made a statement in Political Affairs Committee on report on Nagorno-Karabakh and other territories occupied by Armenia. He stressed that access to the occupied territories was systematically denied by Armenia and made strong complaints in the Committee. Armenians replied in a very aggressive way and obviously during debate they lost sympathy from present MP’s in the room. It becomes more and more clear that Armenia is genuine aggressor, not only on the field but also in the language in political institutions.

Similar situation occurred to Mme Markovic, rapporteur on report “Inhabitants of Azerbaijan are deliberately deprived of water” (the Sarsang report). Mme Markovic is not granted access to Sarsang basin, and she also made strong complaints about Armenian refusal, going against basic principles of Council of Europe.

Both reports are now expected to be discussed in November, without including factual assessments from Armenian side. Reports will for sure emphasize this bad will by Armenians and will raise awareness in international public opinion about what is really happening today in Nagorno-Karabakh and other occupied territories.
Obviously they want to hide their criminal and illegal occupation of Azerbaijani territory, but both refusals will go straight against their interest. It will not be accepted that they refuse to cooperate on this issue with the Council of Europe.

I regretfully state that other international institutions made a very wrong and unfortunate step by running away with the orders of power centers, thus, refusing to observe elections in Azerbaijan, reliable partner. This decision clearly proved the essence of their crafty purposes against Azerbaijan. Finally, I’m grateful to my colleagues, who voted in favor of the EOM despite strong pressure in CoE.

Strasbourg, 1st October 2015.

Elkhan Suleymanov, MP.