site.btaCentral Election Commission to Determine Polling Stations' Locations Abroad

The Central Election Commission (CEC) is expected on Saturday to determine the locations in the countries where polling stations will be set up abroad, as well as their number. According to the schedule for the April 19 vote, March 28 is the deadline for the CEC to do so.

“We expect to receive the opinion of the Foreign Ministry tomorrow and then adopt our decision on opening polling stations abroad,” CEC spokesperson Rositsa Mateva told the Bulgarian National Television on Friday.

At Friday's CEC meeting, Mateva said that the heads of diplomatic or consular missions had not made proposals to open polling stations in honorary consulates in the United Kingdom, the United States and Turkiye. The CEC decided to send a letter with questions to the Elections Working Group at the Foreign Ministry regarding why there were no proposals to open polling stations in honorary consulates in the three countries.

At the beginning of the year, Parliament amended the Election Code and limited to 20 the number of polling stations outside diplomatic and consular missions in countries that are not members of the European Union.

On Thursday, the CEC said that 60,904 applications had been submitted for voting abroad in 67 countries for the April 19 elections. Since the amendment to the Election Code came into force, the CEC has been in talks with the Foreign Ministry to ensure that polling stations can be opened in all available premises of diplomatic and consular missions in the three affected countries – Turkiye, the United Kingdom and the United States – as many as the premises allow, Mateva said.