Bas Belder neemt deel aan Verkiezingswaarnemers Groep van het Europees Parlement bekend (en)

Parliament set up its Election Observation Group for the 7th legislature on Wednesday. The group, of 13 MEPs, will be co-chaired by Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Gabriele Albertini i (EPP, IT), and Development Committee Chair Eva Joly (Greens/EFA, FR). Its first assignment will be to observe the January 2010 presidential elections in Ukraine.

The group's members are Ignacio Salafranca (EPP, ES), Filip Kaczmarek i (EPP, PL), Andrzej Grzyb i (EPP, PL), chair of the Conference of Committee Chairs Luis Yanez Barnuevo i (S&D, ES), Véronique de Keyser i (S&D, BE), Michael Cashman i (S&D, UK), Fiona Hall i (ALDE, UK), Alexander Graf Lambsdorff i (ALDE, DE), Martin Callanan (ECR, UK), Gabriele Zimmer i (GUE/NGL, DE) and Bastiaan Belder i (EFD, NL).

Elections likely to be observed

In the first half of 2010, MEPs are considering sending delegations to observe parliamentary elections in Tajikistan (28 February), presidential elections in Togo (28 February), presidential elections in Ivory Coast (February/March); presidential and parliamentary elections in Sudan (11 April), parliamentary elections in Sri Lanka (April, date not yet fixed), and parliamentary elections in Ethiopia (23 May).

MEPs are also likely to observe parliamentary elections in Afghanistan and presidential and parliamentary elections in Palestine (dates not yet fixed).

Before undertaking electoral missions, MEPs will have to sign a code of conduct requiring them, inter alia, to "maintain strict political impartiality" and "to refrain from making comments to the public or to the media" before election day.