Saturday, June 13, 2009 TEHRAN: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has taken a strong early lead in his bid for a second term as Iran's president, chalking up 69 percent of the vote after 19 percent of ballots were counted in Friday's election, the elections chief said. Ahmadinejad received 3,462,548 votes, compared to 1,425,678 for his closest challenger, former premier Mir Hossein Mousavi, said Kamran Daneshjoo, chairman of the electoral commission at the interior ministry. That gave Ahmadinejad 69.04 percent of the vote and Mousavi 28.42 percent in the massively supported elections which saw long queues at polling stations from early morning and forced continual extensions of the cut-off time. Mousavi, Ahmadinejad's challenger-in-chief, had earlier claimed a landslide victory in Iran's most hotly contested election since the Islamic revolution 30 years ago. "In line with the information we have received, I am the winner of this election by a substantial margin," Mousavi told a news conference in Tehran. Only minutes earlier, close Mousavi aide Ali Akbar Mohatshemi-Pour told media his candidate had won 65 percent of the vote. State news agency, however, announced that Ahmadinejad had won re-election. "Doctor Ahmadinejad, by getting a majority of the votes, has become the definite winner of the 10th presidential election," it said. The conflicting claims came even as crowds of voters were still queuing to cast their ballots long after voting was officially over at 10:00 pm (1730 GMT).
Saturday, June 13, 2009 TEHRAN: Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has taken a strong early lead in his bid for a second term as Iran's president, chalking up 69 percent of the vote after 19 percent of ballots were counted in Friday's election, the elections chief said. Ahmadinejad received 3,462,548 votes, compared to 1,425,678 for his closest challenger, former premier Mir Hossein Mousavi, said Kamran Daneshjoo, chairman of the electoral commission at the interior ministry. That gave Ahmadinejad 69.04 percent of the vote and Mousavi 28.42 percent in the massively supported elections which saw long queues at polling stations from early morning and forced continual extensions of the cut-off time. Mousavi, Ahmadinejad's challenger-in-chief, had earlier claimed a landslide victory in Iran's most hotly contested election since the Islamic revolution 30 years ago. "In line with the information we have received, I am the winner of this election by a substantial margin," Mousavi told a news conference in Tehran. Only minutes earlier, close Mousavi aide Ali Akbar Mohatshemi-Pour told media his candidate had won 65 percent of the vote. State news agency, however, announced that Ahmadinejad had won re-election. "Doctor Ahmadinejad, by getting a majority of the votes, has become the definite winner of the 10th presidential election," it said. The conflicting claims came even as crowds of voters were still queuing to cast their ballots long after voting was officially over at 10:00 pm (1730 GMT).
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