EU delegation meets EC officials

The European Union’s (EU) “exploratory mission” called EUEM on Monday started a meeting with Election Commission (EC) officials to discuss matters related to possible deployment of an observation mission during Bangladesh’s planned 13th parliamentary elections.

An EC spokesman said commission’s joint secretary Moin Uddin Khan was leading a group of four officials in the meeting with the eight-member EUEM team while their talks began at 3 pm at EC’s conference room.

Talking to BSS EC’s assistant director and alternative information officer Asadul Haque said the EUEM team was being led by “senior election expert” Riccardo Chellery.

He said the EU’s pre-election mission was also was scheduled to meet later on Monday with Election Commissioner retired brigadier general Abul Fazal Md Sanaullah while during their Bangladesh visit the team was holding discussions with different government and private stakeholders on the election issues.

EC Secretariat Senior Secretary Akhtar Ahmed earlier said the EUEM team would meet the EC officials and the commissioner to discuss their preparedness to ensure free and fair elections and the political environment ahead of the polls.