Joint Opinion on the Electoral Code of Moldova as of March 27, 2007

Elections in Moldova have been observed by international organisations for many years, and the election laws have been reviewed by the Venice Commission and OSCE/ODIHR. The Venice Commission and OSCE/ODIHR issued a joint opinion in 2006 and the law has been amended after that. The Vice Speaker of the Parliament has listed in the “Report on the implementation of recommendations provided by the Council of Europe and the OSCE/ODIHR experts” which recommendations have been followed and has given the reasons for why some recommendations have not been followed. More precisely, the Parliament reported that most of the CoE experts’ recommendations were accepted and inserted in the text of the law, while “10 objections and proposals have been partially accepted or have not been accepted with the relevant arguments”. This Opinion should be read in conjuction with the Joint opinion on the Electoral Code of Moldova adopted at the 66th plenary session of the Venice Commission (17-18 March 2006, CDL-AD(2006)001), as a number of previous recommendations remain to be addressed.