OSCE worried over cutback in observers for Russia's polls

1 Nov, 2007 02:37 / Updated 17 years ago

The main international election watchdog has expressed concern over Russia's decision to restrict the number of international observers when the country goes to the polls in December. The delegation from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in E

The OSCE says this could seriously limit proper observation of the election. On Wednesday, Russia's Central Election Committee started to send out invitations to monitor the election.  It decided to reduce the number of observers to 400, as compared with over a thousand during the previous campaign in 2003. Moscow says this number is enough as even smaller delegations were sent to the U.S, Poland and the Baltic countries. It added that it is up to Russia to decide on how many people to invite.