June 13 (SeeNews) - Kosovo's early general elections held last Sunday were genuinely competitive and peaceful, but political will is needed to address some issues related to the election process, the mission of European Union observers said on Tuesday.
"[...] the election process was negatively impacted by long-standing weaknesses, in particular: inaccurate voter lists that are vulnerable to fraud, an electoral system open to abuse, and a largely flawed system for Out-of-Kosovo voting," the EU Election Observation Mission (EU EOM) said in a statement published on the website of the European External Action Service (EEAS).
There are still entries of deceased persons in the voter lists, and the data of voters living outside of Kosovo may be misused in the voting process, the EU observers said. They were also concerned by the intimidation and violence that occurred in the Kosovo Serb community against non-Srpska Lista candidates and voters during the campaign.
"This raises questions over the credibility of the democratic process in those areas," the observation mission added.
The short timeframe in which the elections were held affected negatively the entire process, especially the vote of the diaspora. It is estimated that some 500,000 Kosovars are residing abroad, but the Central Election Commission received just 20,354 applications for out-of-Kosovo voting, of which 15,118 were successfully registered.
"While those residing abroad are entitled to vote, both the method for out-of-Kosovo voting and its implementation have failed to offer a functional, inclusive and fraud-proof system for exercising their right to vote," the observers said.
The observers described the election day as calm without major incidents, including in the north of the country. However, there was a high frequency of family voting, as well as a lot of cases of abusive voter assistance.
The excessive presence of observers from some political entities was also perceived as problematic by the EU observers.
The mission also noted that the vote count procedures were not always followed, as the polling staff was not enough trained.
The report described the Central Election Commission as politically inclusive and widely transparent in its actions. However, it often delayed to publish voter information and decisions regarding the electoral process.
During the campaign voters were generally offered pluralistic information on the political forces in competition, the report said.
A centre-right coalition led by Democratic Party of Kosovo (PDK) won 33.91% of Sunday's vote, according to official results based on 99.88% of the ballots counted.