Hugues Mingarelli, Head of the EU Delegation to Ukraine, expects that the elections in amalgamated hromadas will take place this year. He stated this, speaking at the All-Ukrainian August Conference devoted to the launch of the New Ukrainian School.

"We hope that after all stakeholders express their opinion on local elections, it will be possible for the CEC to take the necessary steps and hold elections by the end of the year," he said.

The diplomat said that he knows there is currently a discussion on this issue regarding the appointment of elections, which, in his opinion, as usually in Ukraine, takes a long time. At the same time, Mr Mingarelli assured that discussion process is an indicator that Ukraine is a democratic country. At the same time, he stressed that decentralisation reform was "a large-scale success" in Ukraine.

"Wherever I go, Ukrainian citizens say that, due to the decentralisation reform, their lives have improved – they now have the opportunity to repair roads, they were able to build and repair schools, but this would not have happened if the decentralisation reform had not taken place," he said.

As it was reported, on 9 August, the Central Election Commission applied to the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Legal Policy and Justice for clarification in connection with the inconsistency of the legislation on referendums, the possibility of appointing the first and additional local elections without a local referendum by the Central Election Committee in accordance with the law. on the support of the voluntary association of territorial communities, voluntary adherence to the united territorial community.

More comments on the situation with the appointment of elections in AHs are available HERE

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