The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) has received permission from 48 countries to hold early parliamentary elections on their territory on October 2.

There is still no permission from three countries where there are large Bulgarian communities - Italy, Greece and Canada.

This was stated by the permanent secretary and chairman of the Working Group "Elections" at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ivan Kondov, at a briefing in the department today. 

Regarding these three countries, he explained that they usually ask for the exact address of sections to be revealed and then allow voting on the country's territory. 

Two machines will be used to vote in the polling stations in October if more than 349 people voted in previous elections

In the Czech Republic, polling stations outside the Bulgarian embassy in Prague will not be opened due to a decision of the Czech authorities, Kondov said.

He emphasized that in the previous elections, 7 extraordinary sections were opened outside the embassy.

Kondov called on our compatriots who are in the Czech Republic and wish to exercise their right to vote, to go to the embassy in Prague.

Kondov also noted that an option is being sought to form 3 sections for voting in the embassy, ​​but for now technically there is no such possibility. 

Talks with the Egyptian authorities continue, Ivan Kondov informed.

The submitted applications for voting abroad as of today are 16,611. Kondov appeals to Bulgarian citizens to submit the maximum number of applications, as this will speed up the voting process.

When submitting applications, most of the data is automatically entered into the list and this speeds up the process, he emphasized. 

The most applications for voting were submitted by Bulgarian citizens in Turkey - 10,146, Great Britain - 1,147;

Germany - 1112;

Spain – 705;

The USA - 566 and Italy - 310, noted Kondov and added that 55 thousand applications were submitted in the last election (November 14, 2021).

Due to the repeal of the law on the state of emergency, it will not be possible to vote with expired identity documents, Ivan Kondov pointed out. 

Kondov also said that the Central Election Commission sent a letter to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, asking them to take over the delivery of the voting machines.

He recalled that the electoral commission made a decision abroad in 289 places to vote by machine - 55 places with one machine, 234 places with 2 machines, and the machines for abroad are 523.