Home > 1.1.1.4 Restrictions to the right to vote > KYRGYZ REPUBLIC- Joint Opinion on the Draft Electoral Law
 
 
 
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Paragraph 38
 

C. Limitation on suffrage rights


The OSCE/ODIHR and the Venice Commission previously recommended[1] that these provisions be amended so that denial of (active and/or passive) suffrage rights can occur only where a person has been convicted of committing a crime of such a serious nature that forfeiture of political rights is indeed proportionate to the crime committed and only where a judge has made a specific determination that the circumstances of the individual case require forfeiture of voting rights.[2]The blanket restriction on the right to vote for “citizens adjudicated by court as legally incapable” appears problematic.[3]


[1] CDL-AD(2011)025, par. 19-25.


[2] Code of Good Practice in Electoral Matters, I.1.1.d.v; Hirst v. United Kingdom, No. 74025/01 (6 October 2005), available at www.echr.coe.int; Scoppola v. Italy (No. 3) no. 126/05 (22 May 2012) does not go so far and states that “the Contracting States may decide either to leave it to the courts to determine the proportionality of a measure restricting convicted prisoners’ voting rights, or to incorporate provisions into their laws defining the circumstances in which such a measure should be applied”.


[3] Alajos Kiss v. Hungary, No. 38832/06 (20 May 2010).