Uncanceled blank ballots found in Baranovichi

2001-09-18 17:40:00

Baranovichi, 18 September. More than 150 blank ballots were found by a garbage container near the building that housed a polling station in Baranovichi, Brest region, during the recent presidential election. The bulletins were found on September 17 by a local resident who handed them to the editorial office of the local private newspaper Intex Press. The bulletins did not bear signatures of two members of the precinct commission as required by electoral regulations. According to an expert of a local publishing company, the found bulletins had been press-printed, not made with the help of a photocopier or a Risograph printer. Under Belarusian legislation, the quantity of the blank ballots given to a precinct commission and the number of the unused bulletins must be registered in special acts. The unused bulletins must be canceled and sealed up before the vote count. Mikhail Yaroshuk, the former chairman of the Baranovichi City Election Commission, was not able to explain how the blank bulletins could have been trashed and why there were not commission members' signatures on them. Now some of the found bulletins are kept at the Intex Press office whereas another part has been handed to the local branch of the Belarusian Helsinki Committee. Representatives of Baranovichi's organizations that were involved in election observation - the Belarusian Helsinki Committee and the Vyasna Human Rights Center - intend to file a complaint with the Prosecutor's Office and the Central Election Commission.