KHOROG, February 18, 2010, Asia-Plus  -- 196 people have applied as candidates for the GBAO regional legislature (Majlis) and 24 of them have not been registered by the regional commission for election to the regional council, Tavakkal Ramazonov, head of the regional commission, said in an interview with Asia-Plus.

“One of those candidates was not registered because he does not have residence permit for specific address in the region, 21 others failed to submit all necessary documents to the electoral commission, and two other candidates were not registered because their previous convictions have not been retracted,” Ramazonov  said.

Thus, 172 candidates are now competing for 61 seats in the GBAO regional legislatures, including 61 members of the People’s Democratic Party (PDPT), 21 members of the Islamic Revival Party (IRPT), 17 members of the Communist Party (CPT), 5 members of the Agrarian Party (APT), 3 members from the Party of Economic Reforms, one member of the Social-Democratic Party (SDPT), one member of the Democratic Party (DPT) and 63 unaffiliated persons.