Pa Daly
Question:413. Deputy Pa Daly asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs if Ireland will consider sending observers to the forthcoming Armenian elections. [26759/21]
View answerTuesday, 18 May 2021
Questions (413, 425)
Patrick Costello
Question:425. Deputy Patrick Costello asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs his views on the importance of international election observation; if he will list by country since February 2020 the election observation missions that the OSCE and EU sought nominations for from his Department; the number nominated in each case; the 2021 budget for election observation; the amount spent to date; if he will nominate Irish election observers from the current and previous rosters that are vaccinated against Covid-19 to OSCE and EU election observation missions in view of ongoing Covid-19 vaccination programmes; when he plans to recruit new observers to the roster; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [26044/21]
View answerWritten answers
I propose to take Questions Nos. 413 and 425 together.
Most of the issues raised in these questions have been comprehensively addressed in the answer to Question 777 of 24 March 2021.
The budget for overseas election observation in 2021 is €180,000, of which €4,616 has been disbursed to date, reflecting standard insurance costs for this budget line.
Given the COVID-19 pandemic and associated public health considerations concerning travel, Ireland has not nominated volunteer election observers since March 2020. Resumption of nominations remains under review in the light of evolving public health considerations, particularly, as regards international travel, and will not include either the Armenian or Moldovan calls received this month.
Since February 2020 the EU sought nominations from the Department in respect of four election observation missions. The Department nominated 1 LTO (long term observer) and 4 STOs (short term observers) for an EU election observation mission in Bolivia scheduled for May 2020 and nominated 3 LTOs and 3 STOs for an EU election observation mission in Sri Lanka scheduled for April 2020. However, in March 2020 the EU High representative/Vice President suspended the deployment of both these EU EOMs in line with the EU’s efforts to reduce the spread of COVID-19. Due to the challenges posed by the public health pandemic the EU did not issue any further calls until September 2020. Between September 2020 and April 2021, the EU issued a call for long-term observers for two election observation missions – one for elections that took place in Ghana in December 2020 and one for proposed Parliamentary and Representative Council elections planned to take place in Ethiopia in June 2021. In both instances, calls were not made for short-term observers. Instead, to mitigate COVID risks, the EU focused on sourcing short-term observers locally through diplomatic channels, involving either diplomatic staff (as is often the norm) or volunteers identified with the support of diplomatic channels. The election observation mission to Ethiopia has since been cancelled as agreement on key parameters for the deployment of the mission could not be reached with Ethiopian authorities.
In February 2020, 1 long-term observer and 2 short-term observers for an OSCE election observation mission to Azerbaijan, were deployed from the Irish roster. Since then the OSCE sought nominations from the Department in respect of 16 election observation missions. Three calls for observers to North Macedonia, Poland and Serbia were issued in February 2020. However, in March 2020 the OSCE cancelled election observation missions to North Macedonia and Serbia due to COVID-19. Between July 2020 and March 2021 the calls for 11 election observation missions were conducted as Limited Election Observation Missions (LEOM), without deployment of short-term observers. This included election observation missions to the USA, Montenegro, Kyrgyzstan (Parliamentary elections), Georgia, Ukraine, Moldova (Presidential elections), Romania, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan (Presidential elections), Bulgaria and Albania. Two of these (Georgia and Albania) were initially sent as both calls for long-term observers and short-term observers and the call for short-term observers was cancelled when the mission was scaled back to LEOMs due to COVID-19. Five of these (USA, Montenegro, Kyrgyzstan (Parliamentary elections), Moldova and Romania) were initially sent as calls for long-term observers with the intention of issuing a call for short-term observers, and then scaled back to LEOMs due to COVID-19. In May 2021, the OSCE issued two further calls for observers for election observation missions for Parliamentary elections in Moldova and Armenia. As outlined in previous replies it is not the practice to nominate missions for non-developing countries (as per OECD-DAC criteria) which would include the USA, Bulgaria and Romania.