By IRNA
Tehran : Broad turn out of Iranian nation and their officials at the 8th Majlis elections was atop foreign media news on Friday.
Al-Arabiya TV reported that the Iranians attended the polling stations broadly throughout Iran during the first hours of vote casting for the 8th Majlis elections on Friday.
The reporter of that TV network Hassan Fahs added, “The Iranians rushed to the election polls at early morning hours, when some voters prefer to cast their votes.”
Fahs who is in Iran to cover election news side by side with dozens of other foreign media reporters reiterated, “The Iranians are expected to appear at the voting stations in greater numbers in later afternoon hours, as they usually do.”
The CNN TV reporter, too, referring to the broad participation of the Iranians at the polls, said, “Iran’s Supreme Leader, too, cast his vote in Tehran in the morning.”
One of the voters at a highly busy polling station told the CNN reporter, “Although there are some reports on low participation of the people, you see that we are here at the polls.”
The France Press Agency (AFP) reporter in Tehran, too, had an analytic story on various political factions that are present at this round, emphasizing that the Iranian Parliament is unique in the Middle East region and in the most real one.
That news agency wrote, “The Iranian parliament has greater powers and authorities compared to the parliaments in other regional countries.”
The AFP in another news item quoted Iran’s Deputy Interior Minister Ali-Reza Aref as saying, “The turnout in Iran’s parliamentary elections on Friday is “glorious” and higher than in previous legislative polls, the top election official said.
“So far it has been a glorious and the people have responded to the supreme leader’s (Ayatollah Ali Khamenei) call.”
“Observers who have monitored several past elections admit that so far we have an election with a more glorious participation and a healthier process.
“If this trend continues, we will have the maximum turnout,” added Afshar.”
Polls opened at 8:00 am (0430 GMT) and were due to close at 6:00 pm (1430 GMT), although this is likely to be extended until late in the evening if there is heavy turnout.
4,755 hopefuls are competing at this round of Iran’s Parliamentary elections at 207 constituencies.
There are 45,075 voting stations for the 8th Majlis elections, where as their number was 39,855 for the 7th elections throughout Iran.
The Iranians will choose their 290 lawmakers on Friday.