OSCE mission won’t observe Kazakhstan’s nuclear plant referendum

The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) will not send an observation mission for Kazakhstan’s upcoming referendum on the construction of a nuclear power plant, according to Mukhtar Yerman, secretary of the Central Election Commission of Kazakhstan.

The OSCE’s Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) refused to observe the referendum, citing scheduling conflicts due to numerous other election-related activities.

«On Sept. 17, we received a response from OSCE ODIHR stating they would not be able to deploy observers for the Oct. 6 referendum due to the high number of election-related events scheduled in the coming months,» Yerman explained.

Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has also extended invitations to four other major international organizations: the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the Organization of Turkic States (OTS), the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). All of these organizations confirmed their participation in observing the referendum.

All in all, 177 observers from 30 countries and 200 foreign journalists from 37 nations have been accredited to monitor the referendum. In 2021, OSCE observers noted that Kazakhstan’s parliamentary elections lacked «genuine competition,» emphasizing the need for political reforms.