HAJILI v. AZERBAIJAN JUDGMENT 5 materials on possible criminal violations to the Prosecutor General’s Office regarding 29 PECs. ... The process of invalidation of aggregated results in four constituencies by the CEC did not have sufficient legal grounds or an evidentiary basis, nor was the process transparent. The CEC decisions on the invalidation of the election results in the four constituencies concluded that there were “unacceptable modifications performed on the protocols and law infringements which made it impossible to determine the will of the voters” but did not provide any factual basis to support this conclusion. ... Furthermore, when it invalidated results, the CEC did not make the required initial factual inquiry [as required by Article 170.2 of the Election Code], and ignored Article 108.4 of the Election Code, which authorizes the CEC to order a recount of votes in a constituency if the protocols and documents submitted by the ConEC reveal “mistakes, inadmissible corrections and inconsistencies.” Protocols of ConECs and PECs were not examined or reviewed at CEC sessions. Invalidation of results in a polling station was premised solely on the conclusion of an individual CEC member as to whether a protocol should be invalidated. The judgment of a single CEC member that there were deficiencies in the protocol was accepted as established fact without any explanation of the alleged defect or identification of the number of votes involved. Accordingly, there was no factual basis presented publicly for invalidating results in any of the four constituencies, which is particularly troubling since the CEC registered few complaints that alleged violations in these constituencies. ... The adjudication of post-election disputes in the courts largely disregarded the legal framework, and fell short of internationally accepted norms. ... In most cases, complaints and appeals were either dismissed without consideration of the merits or rejected as groundless by both the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court. Opposition candidates appealed the CEC’s invalidation of results in constituencies 9, 42 and 110. The Court of Appeal upheld the three CEC decisions without any investigation or review of the primary documents and evidence, such as the PEC protocols. In constituency 9, the appellant petitioned the Court of Appeal to examine the protocols, which had been forwarded to the Prosecutor General’s office by the CEC. This petition was denied. In constituency 42, the appellant made an identical request and the court again denied the petition, ruling that it was impossible to obtain the protocols from the Prosecutor General within the legal deadline. The CEC was not able to explain or give any information as to any specific defect in an invalidated protocol or offer any explanation as to what change to a protocol was sufficient for invalidation. ... Proceedings in the Supreme Court did not correct the shortcomings noted above. The Supreme Court upheld each CEC decision.”