ESTONIA ON RUSSIA'S OSCE COMMITMENTS

C O N F I D E N T I A L TALLINN 000732

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

FOR EUR/RUS, EUR/NB

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/09/2017
TAGS: KDEM PREL PHUM RS EN
SUBJECT: ESTONIA ON RUSSIA'S OSCE COMMITMENTS

REF: SECSTATE 153309

Classified By: DCM KAREN DECKER for reasons 1.4 (b) & (d)


1. (C) On November 9, PolEcoff delivered reftel points to
Lauri Kuusing, MFA Russia Desk Officer. Kuusing said the
GOE is pleased to see that the U.S. position is in line
with that of the EU. He also stated that the GOE, along
with its EU partners, finds it 'unacceptable' that the
Government of Russia (GOR) is trying to change established
international regulations on the monitoring of elections.


2. (C) According to Kuusing, the GOE only received their
invitation to monitor the Duma elections last week. Last
September, the GOE had hoped to send five monitors to
Russia, but is now hoping to be allowed to send at least
one. The GOE has not yet decided who their representative
will be.


3. (C) Kuusing also told us that the election issue was
raised during a meeting on November 8 in Tallinn between
Director of the Second European Division from the Russian
MFA, Pavel Kuznetzov, and Simmu Tikk, Estonian MFA Director
of the Third Political Department (Russia). The GOE
representatives raised the question of the status of
campaigns in the upcoming elections in Russia. The GOR
responded that official campaigning began two days ago
(November 6),but noted that since the focus is mainly on
television media, the campaigns are not very visible on the
street.

PHILLIPS