GENERAL ELECTIONS IN AZERBAIJAN.

Presidential and parliamentary elections and a referendum on the country’s new constitution were held in Azerbaijan yesterday. A total of 587 candidates competed on party slates and in single-mandate constituencies for the 125 seats of Azerbaijan’s Milli Majlis. Eight parties, including the Popular Front of former president Abulfaz Elcibey and other opposition parties, took part in the legislative election, which the governing Yeni Azerbaijan Party looked set to win. The Central Electoral Commission disqualified several parties, including the Musavat Party, headed by Isa Gambar, and the Communist Party, led by its former ideologist Ramiz Akmedov, as well as several hundred individual candidates, on the grounds that some of the signatures they had been required to collect for registration (50,000 per party and 2,000 per individual candidate) were not authentic. The draft constitution establishes a presidential form of rule, tailored for President Heydar Aliyev, who looks set to win reelection. (14)

Moscow Claims Political Victory in Azerbaijan Oil Deal.