Voters in Kyrgyzstan granted sweeping powers to President Sadyr Japarov on Sunday (11 April) in a constitutional referendum that will also allow him to run for re-election, preliminary results showed.
Japarov, a 52-year-old populist, has brushed aside political opponents since coming to power on the back of a political crisis last October in the poor Central Asian country.
The EU on Tuesday (6 October) said it has “taken note” of the declaration made the same day by the Central Electoral Commission that the results of the elections held on Sunday are not valid.
A disputed parliamentary vote saw Japarov’s predecessor, Sooronbay Jeenbekov, become the third Kyrgyz president to resign during a political crisis since the country’s independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 as Japarov won backing to lead from the political elite.