Election experts from the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) presented the final report on Albania's 2023 local elections during a visit to Tirana that took place from 4 to 6 December 2023.
Representatives from the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, the Ad Hoc Parliamentary Committee on Electoral Reform, the Central Election Commission, the Audio-Visual Media Authority and civil society organizations met with the ODIHR experts and discussed key findings and recommendations outlined in the report.
The discussions covered both the positive steps taken before the elections and the recommendations that are yet to be implemented. Priority areas highlighted included preventing misuse of administrative resources and vote-buying practices, ensuring voting secrecy, reviewing defamation laws, safeguarding media editorial freedom and enhancing the effectiveness of election administration.
ODIHR also suggested potential areas for collaboration with national institutions, to bring the electoral process in line with OSCE commitments and international standards, offering support through legal reviews and thematic workshops. The authorities expressed an interest in engaging in further discussions to address these recommendations.
ODIHR's election observation methodology includes an assessment of countries' efforts to implement previous recommendations through changes in legislation, procedures and practices. For Albania, the latest ODIHR observation mission evaluated the follow-up to recommendations from the ODIHR final reports on the 2019 local elections and the 2021 parliamentary elections. The reports concluded that three recommendations had been fully implemented, another seven mostly implemented, and 16 partially addressed, while others remain to be carried out.
In the 1999 OSCE Istanbul Document, all OSCE participating States committed themselves to "follow up promptly the ODIHR's election assessment and recommendations".
