Kathmandu, March 17:

Fourteen international organisations have confirmed that they will observe the constituent assembly election to be held on April 10. Fifty international observers, affiliated with three organisations, have already obtained the government accreditation and also begun observing the process of election monitoring.

“We have accepted the applications of fourteen organisations to work here as international observers. The number may grow as the deadline for application is set for March 20,” said Balkrishna Jha, project assistant of the International Observers Unit at the Election Observers Resource Centre (EORC).

Among the 50 observers, 25 belong to the Carter Center, 24 to Asian Network For Free Elections (ANFREL) and one is from the European Union.

It is anticipated that there will be 102 long-term observers and 405 to 455 short-term observers. The Election Commission has categorised these observers as short-term observers, who will stay in Nepal for not more than two-weeks. According to the updated EORC documents, The Carter Center, ANFREL, Forum Asia, Universal Human Rights Network and the Asian Foundation will send 60, 100, 10, 15 and 20 observers respectively. The European Union, National Democratic Institute (NDI), the Researchers, Unragginodiluce and South Asia Foundation (SAF) will have 100, 125, 25, 5, 6 and 25 observers respectively.

There will be 50 observers from the Embassy of the United States, 10 from International Foundation for Election System (IFES), one from International Crisis Group and 80 from South Asia Forum for Fair Elections (SAFE).

In addition, Jha said the election commissioners from all member countries of South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) or their representatives will be here in Nepal to observe the election. Under the EC’s request, embassies of Japan and Australia have also agreed to observe the election.

Apart from this, around 90,000 national observers will also observe the election to make sure the election is held in a free and impartial manner.