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Polls close in Iran’s presidential election, voting extended in some sites
Iran has started counting ballots cast in the 13th presidential election as voting draws to a close in nearly all of the 21 provinces across the country.
The counting process started as soon as voting ended at 12:00 a.m. (local time) on Saturday. Polling stations opened at 07:00 a.m. across the country on Friday.
Voting has meanwhile been allowed to continue for a maximum two more hours — until 02:00 a.m. local time on Saturday (June 19) — in those polling stations where there are voters still waiting to cast their ballots.
All other polling sites need to close and start counting ballots immediately.
"Polling stations are obliged to accept ballots as long as there are people at polling stations," Constitutional Council spokesman Abbas-Ali Kadkhodaei tweeted.
Over 59 million Iranians are eligible to vote at more than 72,000 polling stations set up countrywide, according to the figures released by election officials. Around 3,500,000 Iranian expatriates were also eligible to join the vote in 234 polling stations set up by the country’s diplomatic missions in various world countries.
City council, midterm parliamentary, and Assembly of Experts elections were also held simultaneously with the presidential vote.