Vote count under way in Iceland’s knife-edge EU referendum | Elections News

Iceland’s management has promised to honour regardless of the nation’s individuals determine.

Vote counting is beneath means in Iceland’s referendum on resuming membership negotiations with the European Union.

Voting stations closed at 10pm native time on Saturday (22:00 GMT), and partial figures began rising early on Sunday.

Primarily based on the preliminary 152,000 of an eligible 270,000 votes, 50.1 p.c have been in opposition to the federal government restarting talks with Brussels, based on broadcaster RUV, the Reuters information company reported.

That could be a swing from an earlier Gallup ballot, which gave the “sure” a slight lead.

A remaining rely is anticipated at about noon on Sunday, as counting up votes within the island nation is a troublesome problem, with ballots coming from cities and rural polling stations by aircraft, boat, and automotive.

The referendum doesn’t have exit polls, and poll counting solely started as soon as voting stations closed.

Pre-referendum polling hinted at how close the vote would be, with totally different surveys placing both aspect narrowly forward, however none straying quite a lot of factors from a good 50/50 cut up.

The vote comes 13 years after Iceland, then led by a Eurosceptic authorities, paused EU accession talks.

“This can be a nice day. We’ve been ready for this for years to have the ability to have a vote,” Prime Minister Kristrun Frostadottir mentioned after casting her vote.

The nation is at present ruled by the pro-EU Social Democratic Alliance, which referred to as the vote and promised to honour regardless of the Icelandic public decides.

If Icelanders vote “sure”, the nation would probably begin years of negotiations with Brussels to hammer out membership phrases. It could then maintain a second referendum on whether or not to formally grow to be a part of the EU.

A International Ministry memo estimated that accession talks may begin by the tip of 2026 and take 18 to 24 months if the nation votes to reopen talks.

Safety, the comparatively sluggish Icelandic economic system, fishing rights, and the way forward for the Icelandic forex, the krona, have all been important themes within the run-up to the vote.

Iceland first utilized to hitch the EU in 2009 amid a financial crisis that hit the nation’s small, uncovered economic system.