‘FM ascertains authenticity of poll observers’

Staff Reporter :
Election Commissioner Md Alamgir said it is the foreign ministry’s (FM) duty to determine who are the real or fake foreign poll observers.

He made the comments while replying to queries of newsmenat his office at Agargaon Nirbachan Bhaban on Wednesday.

Recently a so called Election Monitoring Forum (EMF) organized a dialogue with different stakeholders including EC where four foreign citizens, who do not belong to any election observatory institution, participated in the meeting .

When asked over the issue, EC Alamgir said we have no office abroad. We can investigate into domestic organization and allow them observing the election. But to get information on foreign organization is not possible. It is goes to foreign ministry.

He said we did not call any organization by name to observe the polls

rather we open the floor for all and invite.

EC Alamgir said we will allow those observers in the next parliamentary polls who have experience in observing elections in various countries.

Those who recently took part in dialogue with ECcame as members of international forums but not international observers. We allow all those who want to talk with us. It is not our duty to check who are fake or real.