Azernews.Az

Everything is prepared at a high level for the election of the Azerbaijani president, the chairman of Moldova's Central Election Commission Iurie Ciocan, who is in Azerbaijan to observe the elections, told Trend news agency on October 9, election day.

"Since the opening of the polling stations we visit them as part of an international delegation," Ciocan said. "The elections are being held in a normal mode; in the morning we were present at all the proceedings related to the opening of the ballot stations, i.e. the sealing of ballot boxes, counting of ballots and registration of observers. Logistics at all polling stations is good, and we also noted the installed web cameras at many polling stations in Baku and outside the city."

According to Ciocan, everything is prepared at a high level.

"In our opinion, voter turnout should be high enough as since morning we have observed that people are arriving at polling stations. At one of the stations there was even a queue," he said.

The voting started early on October 9. The country's polling stations opened at 8:00 am and will close at 7:00 pm (local time).

Ten candidates are running for president, including the chairman of the New Azerbaijan Party, President Ilham Aliyev, the chairman of Umid Party Igbal Aghazade, self-nominated candidate MP Zahid Oruj, the chairman of the United Azerbaijan Popular Front Party, MP Gudrat Hasanguliyev, the chairman of Modern Musavat Party Hafiz Hajiyev, the chairman of Azerbaijan Social Democratic Party Araz Alizade, the chairman of the National Revival Movement party, MP Faraj Guliyev, the candidate nominated by the initiative group of voters of the National Council of Democratic Forces, Jamil Hasanli, the chairman of Adalat Party, MP Ilyas Ismayilov and the chairman of the Azerbaijan Democratic Party Sardar Jalaloglu.

The CEC has registered 5,145,000 voters in Azerbaijan, which has a population of around 9.4 million.

In connection with the presidential elections, the Central Election Commission established 5,273 permanent and 219 temporary polling stations.

Web cameras have been installed in 1,000 polling stations in 119 constituencies of Azerbaijan. Unlike in previous years, this time the voting process can be monitored via mobile devices such as smartphones.

A total of 52,000 people are observing the election in Azerbaijan, nearly 1,400 of whom are international observers.

Also, the presidential election is being covered by more than 70 representatives from over 20 international media outlets.