US pre-polls monitoring team to meet AL, BNP tomorrow

The visiting US pre-election assessment mission will hold meetings with Awami League and BNP tomorrow to talk about the next national election in Bangladesh.

The joint IRI and NDI pre-election assessment mission will first hold a meeting with a delegation of BNP at 10:00am at the BNP Chairperson's Gulshan office, reported UNB quoting BNP media cell member Sayrul Kabir Khan.

BNP Secretary General Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir will lead the delegation at the meeting and present the party's observations about the next general election expected to be held in early January next year.

The team will also meet with a delegation of AL, which will be led by AL General Secretary Obaidul Quader, at Sheraton hotel in Banani around 11:00am, sources at AL told The Daily Star.

The joint International Republican Institute (IRI) and National Democratic Institute (NDI) pre-election assessment mission (PEAM) arrived in Bangladesh on Saturday to follow electoral preparations and conduct an independent and impartial assessment.

From October 8 to 12, the six-member delegation will meet with a diverse group of election stakeholders including government officials, political party leaders, election authorities, civil society, and others.

The delegation is co-chaired by Karl F Inderfurth, former assistant secretary of state for South Asian Affairs and Bonnie Glick, former deputy USAID administrator. It also includes Maria Chin Abdullah, former member of the House of Representatives, Malaysia; Jamil Jaffer, former associate counsel to the President of the United States; Manpreet Singh Anand, NDI regional director for Asia-Pacific; and Johanna Kao, IRI senior director, Asia-Pacific Division.

The team had scheduled a meeting with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Bangladesh today.

The delegation will conduct its assessment in accordance with the laws of Bangladesh and consistent with the Declaration of Principles for International Election Observation which was signed in 2005 at the United Nations.

Following the conclusion of its activities, the delegation will release a statement of its key findings, analysis of the pre-election environment. It will also present practical recommendations to enhance the credibility of the process and citizen's confidence in the elections.

NDI and IRI are nonpartisan, nongovernmental organisations that support and strengthen democratic institutions and practices worldwide.

The institutes have collectively observed more than 200 elections in more than 50 countries over the last 30 years.