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Iranians to vote in parliamentary run-off race end of April

Xinhua, March 14, 2016 Adjust font size:

Iran will hold the second round of the Majlis (parliament) elections late next month to fill the remaining vacant seats, an Iranian legal official announced on Monday.

"The Guardian Council (as the highest legislative body of the country) has agreed for the second round of parliamentary elections to be held on April 29," the secretary of the Guardian Council, Ali Pourali Motlaq, told official IRNA news agency.

In the run-off race, 138 hopefuls will compete for the rest 69 seats, Pourali Motlaq was quoted as saying. 221 out of the 290 seats were filled up in the first round of the polls held on Feb. 26.

According to data available from the local media, the reformists and moderates have gained ground in Iran's Friday vote for Majlis, although none of the heavy weight political groups have been able to seize a majority in the first round.

In the 2012 Majlis race, the principlists or the loyalists to Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei and powerful clerics won the majority of about 75 percent in the first round of the votes.

The Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli said earlier this month that the turnout in the first round, out of about 55 million eligible voters, was around 50 percent in capital Tehran and some 62 percent across the country.

While in 2012, the turnout in the first round was more than 64 percent out of some 48 million eligible voters. Endit