84 EU members to be on election duty

[TamilNet, Monday, 14 November 2005, 12:15 GMT]
55 additional officials arrived from European member countries and Switzerland Monday to augment the 29 officials already present to participate with the EU Election Observation Mission (EOM) to "observe voting, counting and tabulation procedures throughout the whole country," a press release issued by the EOM said Monday.

Full text of the press release follows:

The EU Election Observation Mission today Monday completed by the arrival of 55 observers. The total number of EU observers deployed throughout Sri Lanka on Election Day will be of 84. The members of the EU EOM will observe voting, counting and tabulation procedures throughout the whole country.

The EU EOM was established on 23 October upon an invitation of the Commissioner for Elections of the Republic of Sri Lanka. The EU EOM is composed of a Core Team of 7 members and 22 Long Term Observers (LTOs). Since the beginning of November the LTO teams have been working in all parts of the country.

On 14 November, 55 EU Short Term Observers (STOs) arrived in Colombo coming from 21 European Union member states plus Switzerland.

On 15 November the STOs will be deployed throughout Sri Lanka to monitor the opening of polling stations, the voting process, the counting of ballots, and the tabulation of votes at local and national level.

Following the completion of the count, they will rejoin the rest of the team at the EUEOM Headquarters for debriefing prior to the publication of the EU preliminary statement on the 2005 Election process, at a press conference later this week.

More information on the mission, its observation methodology and its code of conduct can be found on the website of the mission The EU EOM will continue to remain in the country until the completion of the whole electoral process.