Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili condemned the alleged use of ethnic minorities to manipulate parliamentary elections.
On October 26, Georgians vote in parliamentary elections, which are key to the future development of the country.
The incident mentioned by Zurabishvili reportedly took place in Marneuli, a southern Georgian city populated mostly by Azerbaijanis.
"It is very immoral to use an ethnic minority to falsify the election," Zurabishvili wrote on social network X, sharing a video showing a man dropping a handful of ballots into a ballot box.
Voting at the polling station was subsequently suspended, Georgia's private news agency InterpressNews reported.
The Central Election Commission announced that the Ministry of Internal Affairs has launched an investigation into the case.
According to media reports, no electronic vote counting was used at the polling station in Marneuli.
For the first time this year, 90% of votes cast in Georgia's parliamentary elections will be counted electronically.
At the end of the election, the devices will print the preliminary voting results. Votes will also be counted manually and the final results will be based on these manual counts.
As of noon (1:00 p.m. Bulgarian time), voter turnout was 22%.
Observers also reported additional incidents and violations at polling stations, including cases of physical violence.
"There is violence in various places and journalistic equipment has been broken. Groups are gathering that exacerbate the situation," commented the Georgian president.
She called on the Ministry of Interior to ensure that the police would respond more quickly and effectively, adding that such tension in polling stations could not be tolerated. | BGNES
