Tehran (AsiaNews) No surprises are expected in the second round of general elections in Iran, which got underway yesterday. Citizens were called to cast ballots to choose the 57 members from in constituencies in Iran that failed to return a winner in the February parliamentary elections.
Even this round of votes, after the first one of Feb. 20 (which saw the victory of a coalition of conservative parties), should render similar results and thus lead to no significant changes.
The February results revealed victory for the coalition of conservative, religious and centrist party candidates, who gained 155 of 229 parliamentary seats.
The conservatives coalition, thus, had already gained an absolute majority in the Iranian Parliament (Majlis), which until then had been dominated by President Kathami's reformist party.
Voter turnout figures are still not available, but abstention is traditionally quite high in Iran during such second rounds of voting.
Due to Iranian voters' disinterest in politics and on account of the exclusion of candidates of various reformist ranks and parties, there was also low turnout (50-57%) during the first round of general elections, the lowest recorded in Iran since 1979.
