DUSHANBE, May 6, 2016, Asia-Plus – The CIS Inter-Parliamentary Assembly (CIS IPA) will send a group of observers to Tajikistan to monitor the upcoming constitutional referendum.

Armenian parliament vice-speaker, Ms. Ermine Nagdalyan, will coordinate the work of the CIS IPA mission of observers.

The CIS IPA mission members reportedly include parliamentarians from the CIS member nations as well as representatives of the CIS IPA Council Secretariat and the International Institute for Monitoring Democracy Development, Parliamentarianism and Suffrage Protection for the Citizens of the IPA CIS Member Nations.

To-date, 62 representatives of CIS member nations, 29 representatives of CIS IPA and one representative of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) have been registered with Tajikistan’s Central Commission for Elections and Referenda (CCER), an official source at Tajik central electoral commission said on May 6.

We will recall that Tajikistan is set to hold a referendum on constitutional amendments on May 22 that would allow incumbent President Emomali Rahmon to run for office for an indefinite number of times.

CIS IPA was created on March 27, 1992 in Almaty (Kazakhstan) under the terms of the Agreement signed by Heads of founding parliaments.  In 1995, the session of the Council of the CIS Heads of State held in Minsk, Belarus consolidated the status of CIS IPA as a fully-fledged international organization. On May 26, 1995 CIS leaders signed the Convention on the Inter-Parliamentary Assembly of Member Nations of the Commonwealth of Independent States eventually ratified by nine CIS parliaments.  Under the terms of the Convention, the CIS IPA was invested with international legitimacy.

The CIS Inter-Parliamentary Assembly consists of national parliamentary delegations.  A Parliamentary Delegation consists of representatives of a Member Nation elected or appointed by the Parliament of a Member Nation Party to the IPA CIS Convention from among their members and in compliance with respective internal regulations.  A parliamentary delegation is led by the Head of parliamentary delegation.  IPA CIS Council is responsible for the organization of work of the Assembly.  The Council is presided over by the Chairperson.