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Iranian women cast their ballots for the presidential elections at a polling station at the Lorzadeh mosque in southern Tehran on May 19, 2017. (Photo by AFP)

Here is a brief look at Press TV newsroom's headlines from 18:00 GMT, May 19, to 08:00 GMT, May 20, 2017.

Iran Elections 2017

Polling stations have closed in Iran’s presidential and city-and-village council elections. Iranians cast their ballots in their large numbers across the country. The voting time was extended for several hours. Some stations have already started counting the ballots. Over 56 million Iranians were eligible to participate in the elections -- with more than one million and two-hundred thousand first-time voters. Leader of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei cast his ballot as soon as the polls opened at eight in the morning local time.

Yemen Cholera Outbreak

The World Health Organization says the Cholera epidemic in Yemen could reach 300 thousand cases within six months. A representative of the UN health agency has warned of an extremely high death toll, describing the outbreak as unprecedented. At least 242 people have died of cholera across Yemen over the past three weeks alone. Tens of thousands of others have been diagnosed with the disease. Humanitarian organizations say Saudi Arabia's war on Yemen and its crippling sea and naval blockade are to blame for the humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen. According to the UN, one child dies every ten minutes from preventable causes in the Arab country. This, as the United States is set to give the go-ahead for a huge controversial arms deal with Saudi Arabia.

Trump due in S Arabia

US President Donald Trump has departed for Saudi Arabia, where he is expected to finalize a controversial arms deal with the kingdom. Trump's visit to Riyadh will be his first foreign trip since he became president. The arms deal between Washington and Riyadh is worth over 100 billion dollars. The sale comes amid Saudi Arabia's almost daily airstrikes in Yemen that has killed over 12 thousand people and caused a humanitarian crisis in the country. Riyadh has been importing tens of billions of dollars of arms from the US over the past years. After visiting Saudi Arabia, Trump will fly to Israel, another major US ally in the region.

Yemen Retaliation

Yemen's army and allied forces say they have fired a ballistic missile at the Saudi capital, Riyadh. In the meantime, Saudi Arabia says it intercepted the projectile in an uninhabited area near Riyadh. The Al Saud regime also announced that Saudi warplanes struck a place near Sana-a where the missile had been fired from. Army and allied forces have time and again carried out retaliatory attacks on Saudi Arabia. Riyadh launched its deadly campaign against Yemen in March 2015 to bring back to power Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, former president who is a staunch ally of Riyadh. Over 12,000 people, most of them civilians, have been killed in Saudi attacks so far.

Libya Deadly Attack

Scores of people have been killed following an attack on a military airbase in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi. Military sources say the attack was carried out on soldiers loyal to General Khalifa Haftar. At least 141 people, most of them military forces, were killed during the assault. No group has claimed responsibility for the attack yet, but terrorists have previously carried out similar attacks on forces associated with the self-proclaimed Libyan National Army. The LNA forces have retaken most of the coastal city since it was overrun by Daesh Takfiri terrorists in 2014.

Syria Talks

The latest round of Syria peace talks comes to an end in Geneva with little progress. The talks were overshadowed by the US military strike in the country. The Syrian government’s chief negotiator says he wants to focus on battling state-sponsored terrorism which has been plaguing his country. From Geneva, Press TV’s Homa Lezgee reports.

Comey Sacking Fallout

Media reports say US President Donald Trump has called fired FBI Director James Comey a nut job, whose removal relieved great pressure on him. According to the New York Times, Trump made the comment during a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Ambassador Sergei Kislyak in the Oval Office on May 10. The US president has already been under pressure for revealing highly sensitive classified data about a Daesh plot during the same meeting. Trump fired Comey a day before the Oval Office meeting. The FBI chief was investigating allegations of the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia in the 2016 election, even though Moscow has repeatedly denied the allegations. Meanwhile, the US Senate Intelligence Committee says Comey has agreed to testify publicly about alleged Russian interference in the elections.

Slamming Illegitimate Strike

Russia’s foreign minister has condemned a US airstrike against Syrian pro-government forces as illegitimate. Lavrov added that it could harm efforts to battle Daesh terrorists in the Arab country. The top Russian diplomat’s comments come after the airstrike in eastern Syria on Thursday targeted a convoy of pro-government forces near the Jordanian border. The Syrian government also slammed what it called a brazen attack.

Baghdad Bombing

In Iraq, two car bombs kill at least 11 people, including four police officers, and leave nearly 20 others wounded. The attacks happened in capital Baghdad's southwest. The first attack targeted a police checkpoint in the area and moments later, the second blast hit a nearby street crowded with civilians. No group has immediately claimed responsibility for the attacks but they bore the hallmarks of the Daesh terrorist group, which has claimed similar bombings in the past.

Iran Election 2017

Partial results from Iran’s presidential election show incumbent President Hassan Rouhani is leading the vote. According to the head of the interior ministry’s election headquarters, Ali Asghar Ahmadi, nearly 26 million votes have been counted. He hailed the high turnout in the elections, and said over 40 million people cast their ballots in Friday’s elections. Ahmadi stressed that final results will be announced later on Saturday. Hassan Rouhani who is supported by the reformists has promised to create a bipartisan government. His main rival, Ebrahim Raeisi, supported by the principlists, has pledged to change the status quo.

Bahrain Rally

Bahraini people have staged fresh rallies in solidarity with prominent Shia cleric Sheikh Isa Qassim ahead of his trial. Protesters in Abu Saibah village called on the Manama regime to end its suppressive measures against the cleric and other activists. Meanwhile, a group of Bahraini scholars has called for nationwide sit-ins and rallies in support of Sheikh Isa Qassim. The cleric is scheduled to stand trial on May 21. He was stripped of his nationality by the Bahraini regime last year for what Manama says using his position to serve foreign interests and promote sectarianism and violence. Sheikh Isa Qassim has denied the allegations as baseless. Bahraini authorities have stepped up their crackdown on anti-regime activists who have been protesting against the ruling Al Khalifah dynasty on a daily basis since 2011.

North Korea Nukes

North Korea says it will rapidly strengthen its nuclear capability as long as the United States keeps it hostile policy toward the country. North Korea’s deputy UN ambassador also said that the stance of his country does not change till the United States insists on its anti-China policy, nasty nuclear threats and blackmail, sanctions and pressure. Meanwhile US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Friday that any military solution to the North Korea crisis would be tragic on an unbelievable scale and Washington was working internationally to find a diplomatic solution. The two countries have been at loggerheads over the US military presence on the Korean Peninsula, which Pyongyang considers as a threat.

 


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