DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Early results in Iran’s presidential election put hard-liner Saeed Jalili ahead Saturday, followed by reformist Masoud Pezeshkian.
The early results, reported by Iranian state television, did not initially put Jalili in a position to win Friday’s election outright, potentially setting the stage for a runoff election.
It also did not offer any turnout figures for the race yet — a crucial component of whether Iran’s electorate backs its Shiite theocracy.
With over 10 million votes counted, Jaili had 4.26 million vote followed by Pezeshkian with 4.24 million. Another candidate, hard-line speaker of the parliament Mohmmad Bagher Qalibaf, had some 1.38 million votes. Shiite cleric Mostafa Pourmohammadi had more than 80,000 votes.
___
This story has been corrected to say 10 million was the overall number of votes initially counted.
