Egyptians in Cairo, Alexandria Vote in Runoff Elections for Parliament

Egyptians in the country's two largest cities and other areas are voting in a series of runoff elections for the country's first parliament since the ouster of autocratic president Hosni Mubarak earlier this year.

The runoff elections in Cairo, Alexandria and seven other provinces will take place Monday and Tuesday, and determine the individual winners of 52 seats in parliament's 498-member lower house. The first round of voting for individual candidates and party lists in the nine provinces happened last week.

Results for the party-list contests announced Sunday by Egyptian authorities show Islamist parties captured an overwhelming majority of votes.

The figures put the Muslim Brotherhood's Freedom and Justice party in the lead with 36.6 percent. The ultra-conservative Salafist Nour Party, which advocates a stricter segregation of the sexes, the full veiling of women and a ban on alcohol, had 24.4 percent, while the liberal Egyptian Bloc captured 13.4 percent, putting it in third place.

Egypt's election commissioner, Abdel-Mooaez Ibrahim, said a record number of people took part in the first round of voting in the nine provinces. Residents of the remaining 18 provinces will cast ballots in two further stages of voting in the coming weeks. Elections for parliament's less-powerful upper house will begin in late January and finish in March.

The man appointed by military rulers to lead a new Cabinet, Kamal al-Ganzouri, said he will delay the announcement of new ministers until Wednesday because ballot counting has taken longer than expected.

Israel, which shares a border and 1979 peace agreement with Egypt, has expressed deep concern about the initial success of the Islamist parties. In a speech Sunday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed hope that "any government to be formed in Egypt will recognize the importance of keeping the peace treaty with Israel in its own right and as a basis for regional security and economic stability." ---VOA News