Foreign Journalists, Organizations, Bid to Monitor Egyptian Elections

Photo Credit: Egypt Independent

According to the State Information Services (SIS), 923 foreign journalists have requested to register in order to cover the presidential election. Of the correspondents, 402 are visiting and 521 live in Cairo. The head of the SIS, Ismail Khairat, said the agency handed over the registration requests to the Supreme Presidential Electoral Council (SPEC) as a preliminary step before issuing cards to journalists allowing them to cover the elections. The Carter Center sent a press release on Monday stating that it had received accreditation to monitor the presidential elections and will send a team of 80 to monitor the election. State department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland welcomed an announcement that Egypt will allow international monitoring.

In further election news, the Egyptian Ambassador to the United States, Sameh Shoukry, said that there was a large turnout in voting on Monday for Egyptians in the U.S. The embassy noted there were three attempted forgeries, when residents that had voted by mail also tried to vote in person, but the Egyptian Foreign Ministry denied all reports of fraud.