Polls close in Sri Lankan parliamentary election

COLOMBO, Nov. 14 (Xinhua) — Voting closed in the Sri Lankan parliamentary election on Thursday at 4 p.m. local time (1030 GMT) and the counting of ballots will start by 4:30 p.m., according to the Sri Lankan Election Commission.
The voting began at 7:00 a.m. Thursday. Over 17.1 million voters were eligible to cast their votes to elect a 225-seat parliament. According to statistics from the Election Commission, voter turnout as of 2:00 p.m. was around 50 percent.
The commission said that postal vote results are expected from around 10:30 p.m., with the final results expected on Friday.
R.M.A.L Rathnayake, chairman of the Election Commission, told the press in Colombo on Thursday that over 8,000 local and international election observers were active.
Police spokesman DIG Nihal Thalduwa stated that the polling has been peaceful, with no election-related violence reported so far.
He said that over 3,100 mobile patrols were deployed to ensure a free and fair election, and 27,000 policemen were deployed to protect the polling centers. ■