Why there wasn’t much democracy to observe during Russia’s elections Grigory Pasko, journalist As is known, many have refused to participate in the observer process for the Russian elections: the Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights of the OSCE, the Nordic Council, observers from the USA and certain countries of Europe… Limited observers did decide to come from the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), as well as delegations from the parliamentary assembly of the CIS and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). Out of the 30-member OSCE delegation, two observers were sent to the elections in Yaroslavl. Commenting on the results of the elections that had taken place in this city, one of them – Polish Member Tadeusz Iwinski, in part, noted such shortcomings at the elections: inconvenient urns [ballot boxes—Trans.] for voting and narrow slots in them. Imagine – you can’t even stuff four ballots at a time in one… The funeral of democracy? Ballot boxes are called “urns” in Russia (photo by Grigory Pasko)