According to Turan, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan blocked the preliminary package of the decision of the Permanent Council of the OSCE to appoint for the next three-year term the OSCE Secretary General; Director of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights; the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media and High Commissioner for National minority.

The decisions included the appointment by the OSCE member countries of all of the above OSCE leadership positions in one common package. In a note of protest sent to the OSCE Permanent Council, the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry expressed its disagreement with the appointment for the next three-year term of the OSCE Representative on Freedom of the Media, French diplomat Arles Desir. The Foreign Ministry of Azerbaijan explains its position by the fact that during his first three-year mandate, which began on July 18, 2017, Desir showed excessive criticism about the situation with freedom of speech in Azerbaijan.

Considering that the decision-making process of the OSCE Permanent Council is based on consensus, the actions of the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry may leave the OSCE leadership decapitated until September this year, when members of the Permanent Council returning from their summer vacations can fully hold their meetings in Vienna, where the organization’s headquarters are located.

The draft new decision will most likely provide for the appointment to these senior positions separately, but according to available information, the OSCE Chairman-in-Office Albania (Albania presides over the OSCE Ministerial Council in 2020) has not yet submitted a draft new decision on the appointment of high-level OSCE representatives.

25 June 2020 / 12:12