Iran Reformist Pezeshkian Wins Presidential Election

Iran's reformist candidate Masoud Pezeshkian on Saturday won a runoff presidential election against ultraconservative Saeed Jalili, the interior ministry said, Menna Zaki reported for the Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Pezeshkian got more than 16 million votes and Jalili more than 13 million out of about 30 million votes cast. I Photo: Ayoub Ghaderi, Mehr News Agency

Pezeshkian got more than 16 million votes and Jalili more than 13 million out of about 30 million votes cast, electoral authority spokesman Mohsen Eslami said, adding that voter turnout stood at 49.8 percent.

The election, called early after the death of ultraconservative president Ebrahim Raisi in a helicopter crash, followed a first round marked by a historically low turnout last week.

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who wields ultimate authority, had called for a higher turnout in the runoff, emphasizing the importance of the election. He said the first-round turnout was lower than expected, but added that it was not an act "against the system."

The ballot comes against a backdrop of heightened regional tensions over the Gaza war, a dispute with the West over Iran's nuclear program, and domestic discontent over the state of Iran's sanctions-hit economy.