Baku, Azerbaijan, Feb. 28
By Fatih Karimov - Trend:
The updated results of parliamentary elections indicate that all 30 leading candidates in Tehran belong to reformists' list
According to Iran's Elections Headquarters, 2.63 million votes have been counted so far, the state-run IRINN TV reported Feb. 28.
Mohammad Reza Aref, a former vice president, stands in first place in the Tehran ballot with 1.287 million votes.
Ali Motahari, a conservative MP who took place in the list of reformist and pro-governments was in the second place with 1.115 million votes.
The head of the conservative list, Gholamali Hadad Adel, a former parliament speaker, who was at the seventh place in the early results have lost his position. He was placed 31st with 855,288 votes.
Almost 2.9-3 million people have participated in the election in Tehran, while some 6.6 million were eligible for voting, Iran's interior minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli said, estimating that the voter turnout at Tehran city reaches 42 percent.
Elections were held for the tenth round of parliament and fifth round of the Assembly of Experts on Feb. 26. Iranians went to the polls in over 1,063 constituencies.
Currently, the Parliament has 290 representatives fourteen of whom represent the non-Muslim religious minorities. Women constitute about eight percent of the Parliament members in Iran.
A total of 4,844 hopefuls, including about 500 women, who were qualified among 12,000 registered candidates by the Guardian Council, were taking part in the race to take the parliamentary seats.
The elected candidates will serve from May 3, 2016 for a four-year term.
The Assembly of Experts will also see its 88 members elected by the people for another eight-year term.