(23 Sep 2018) Election officials in the Maldives say counting has begun in the South Asian island nation's third-ever multi-party presidential election after the polls were kept open longer than planned due to high voter turnout.
More than 260,000 of the 400,000 citizens of the Maldives were eligible to vote at about 400 polling stations across the islands that comprise the Indian Ocean archipelago.
An elections-eve raid of the opposition presidential candidate's main campaign office cast a pall over Sunday's election, widely seen as a referendum on the Maldives' young democracy.
But it did not appear to deter voters, who waited in rain and high temperatures to cast ballots.
Election officials said the first results could be announced late Sunday night.
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