Icelanders vote in snap elections
Xinhua, October 29, 2016 Adjust font size:
Icelanders are heading to the polls on Saturday in snap parliamentary elections after a global tax evasion scandal led to the fall of government in April.
About 246,500 voters are eligible to vote in the elections. Voting began at 9 a.m. (0900 GMT) and is due to close at 10 p.m. (2200 GMT).
The last Gallup poll before the elections showed that the conservative Independence Party, one of two current ruling parties, was leading with 27 percent of the vote.
The anti-establishment Pirate Party, which had taken the lead in many other polls over the months, finished second with 17.9 percent.
Another opposition group, the Left-Green Movement, trailed with 16.5 percent, while the centrist Progressive Party, the other ruling party, was the fourth with just 9.3 percent.
The elections were prompted by the resignation of Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson on April 5 after the so-called Panama Papers suggested Gunnlaugsson and other two Cabinet members had ties with offshore companies.
But for the scandal, general elections would not come until April 2017. Endi