Ukrainian OSCE Chairmanship

Ukraine officially takes over the chairmanship of OSCE on 6/7th December 2012 at the OSCE ministerial council meeting in Dublin, when Ireland hands over, and will thus chair OSCE through 2013. That on the back of some robust criticism by OSCE of the recent Ukrainian parliamentary elections - their final and authoritative report on said […]

OSCE statement on the Ukrainian elections - and what now?

Of all the election reports and statements made by the numerous monitoring groups, as I have written before, the statements and reports of ODIHR/OSCE are those that count, historically at least, in the forming of the EU mindset towards recognition - or not. Here is the “morning after” statement. Nothing surprising in there to be […]

OSCE Interim Election Report - Ukraine 2012 Elections

On 19th October, Prime Minister Azarov made a statement that OSCE had not recorded any violations of the election process. Really? That very same day, OSCE released its interim election report, which would beg to differ!

Recognising Transdnestr - A way to defrost a frozen conflict?

Frozen conflicts have traditionally been very difficult to thaw - despite the best efforts of mediators and negotiators. The Transdnestr region of Moldova, a 60 minute drive from where I live, and a place I have traveled through many times, is no exception.  After 20 years the conflict with Moldova remains as frozen now as […]

Georgia - Free & Fair elections? Ignoring the means and legitimising the ends?

Well the Georgian people have spoken and President Saakashvili’s party are now in the minority. I am neither surprised given the grievous and disgusting material to emerge from a Georgian prison,  nor sorry status quo in Georgia has been broken.  Whilst that may - or may not - prove disastrous for Georgia in the short […]

What weight to give the on-line debate? Freedom of Speech - Freedom House “Freedom of the Net report” and Ukrainian elections

For the first time, Ukraine has been included in the Freedom House, Freedom of the Net report.  Ukraine was ranked as being “Free”. And, well why wouldn’t it be?  No bloggers have been arrested, there is no political interference that is noticeable, and no Internet applications are blocked by the government. Further, the Ukrainian forums are […]

ODIHR/OSCE election monitoring vacancies - Ukraine elections 2012

Short and sweet today. ODIHR/OSCE has these vacancies for the monitoring team related to the October 2012 parliamentary elections in Ukraine. All are based in Kyiv. Obviously from the point of view of both ODIHR/OSCE and Ukraine it is important they are filled quickly. Normal ruminations continue tomorrow!

It’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs competition time!

OK - Stop what you are doing, go find your colouring books, paints and pencils, and put your creative thinking caps on! Quite unusually for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, it is seeking public participation. It encourages designs/logos to be submitted by the very skillful and arty people of Ukraine in readiness for […]

On-line surveys - OSCE

Whilst meandering somewhat aimlessly around the Internet looking for something worthy of comment and thus randomly looking through my “bookmarks” on this computer, I happened to click on the OSCE website link and noticed they have an on-line survey wishing to know our views on security. Why not fill it in I thought, only 11 […]