People and numbers of presidential election observation In Belarus

July 1 saw the launch of both the election campaign and that of observation. At least three organizations will be following the progress of the presidential race and voting this year.

Opposition

"Our observation is not independent. Independent monitoring is conducted by the human rights activists. They are only interested in the technical aspects of the process. Our task is also to protect the number of votes cast in favor of our candidate. We cannot say that we will be unfair in our approach to the job. But we will approach it with interest," said Right of Choice 2015 campaign leader Alyaksei Yanukevich.

At the election, the BPF fully supports the female candidate Tatstsiana Karatkevich. Apart from the BPF activists, the Right of Choice program unites people from Tell the Truth, Christian Democrats (BCD), Social Democrats from the Belarusian Social Democratic Party, the movement For Freedom, the Green, the organizing committee of the Freedom and Progress Party and the REP trade union.

Some of the leaders of these organizations disagree with Mr Yanukevich. Co-chairman of the organizing committee of the Belarusian Christian Democracy, Vital Rymasheuski, for example, promises to mark the violation of the Karatkevich team.

In total, the Right of Choice 2015 participants are going to monitor 1,000 sites - 2 representatives on each. They will monitor almost every sixth voting station. Emphasis will be made on observing the early voting and the number of voters.

Human rights activists

The Human Rights Activists for Free Elections campaign was launched on July 1 - one of its representatives has already visited the CEC session. The monitoring is managed by the unregistered Center Vyasna (Spring) and the Belarusian Helsinki Committee. Valyantsin Stefanovich from Vyasna said that there again will likely be enough work for the election observers:

"I want to note that the comments made by international observers after the last elections have not been considered by the Belarusian authorities. It is especially true about the most fundamental issues: early voting, vote count."

Human rights activists are going to organize a long-term monitoring - 50 people across the country will begin to monitor the elections in the coming days. In addition, from the beginning of the voting, about 200 polling stations will be supervised by Viasna and the BHC.

"We have been working during election campaigns for a long time, and our reports are reflected in the reports of international organizations," said Valyantsin Stefanovich.

Another opposition

Viktar Karnyaienka from the For Fair Elections campaign has also been monitoring the election campaigns in Belarus for many years. "I can say that this time the United Civil Party has instructed me to observe the elections, but our work here is much wider. We are trying to attract to the active opposition previously unbiased people," said Mr Karniyenka.

He also added that his campaign has been ongoing since 2008. This year, at the long-term observation, he plans to use about 100 people. Close to election day, the figure will even reach two thousands.

"You know, a hundred people would be enough to test the waters and to assess democratic elections. Same is true about the election analysis. But we want to involve in the process as many people as possible people, so that they personally see it all," said Mr Karniyenka.