Elections

The deadline for submission of lists for April 24 early parliamentary elections expires at midnight on Friday.

Parties can withdraw their electoral lists by midnight on April 12, and the national electoral commission has to declare lists valid by midnight on April 13, and publish in the Official Gazette the final order in which electoral lists will appear on the ballot paper.

After the controversial Iranian-Turkish citizen businessman Reza Zarrab was arrested in the U.S. last week, it was not only cheered by thousands of ordinary Turkish citizens but also welcomed by all circles of opposition and dissidence as a fresh chance to weaken the ruling party. This reaction from ordinary citizens who have lost trust in the Turkish judicial system is understandable.

Almost half a million names on Macedonia's electoral roll of 1.8 million need more verification, the State Electoral Commission said after an initial check-up aimed at weeding out fake voters.

A bill prepared by Bulgarian MPs proposes the imposition of BGN 50 fine for people not voting in elections and depriving them of social benefits for a period of three months.

The bill has been devised and adopted at first reading at the proposal of one of the parties supporting the ruling coalition - the Patriotic Front (PF).

Finally, the long expected "conventional family criteria" will be introduced to the media. 

Bulgaria has climbed 9 spots over the past year in the Economist Intelligence Unit's Democracy Index in 2015 compared to the year before.

The Bulgarian parliament is expected to deliver its opinion on the introduction of remote electronic voting on Thursday.

On Tuesday, the parliamentary Legal Affairs Committee approved the introduction of electronic voting.

The issue was the subject of a referendum which was held simultaneously with the local elections on October 25 last year.

A committee with Bulgaria's Parliament is set to debate on Tuesday a draft bill that supports the introduction of online voting.

The head of Parliament's legal committee, Danail Kirilov (from the main ruling GERB party) is quoted by Dnevnik.bg as saying he will propose that amendments to electoral law should be adopted by the end of April to allow citizens to vote online.

Polling stations closed at 19:00 on Sunday in the second round of the elections for a new leader of New Democracy party.

An ND announcement said it had asked all polling stations to close and end voting, except in cases were voters were still inside the polling station.

Tomorrow will be a new day for New Democracy and Greece, said candidate Kyriakos Mitsotakis after voting just before 11:00 am on Sunday at Kifissia polling station accompanied by his son.