Parliamentary polls in Georgia on October 1 were seen as a key test of competing visions of the country's political course. Follow the elections and their aftermath with RFE/RL.
So, the ticker is down and it looks like there will be a bit more of a delay with the vote results. After a couple hundred updates and a good 15 hours, this liveblog is now an archive. Thanks to everyone for reading and following.
RFE/RL's Georgian Service reports: Fearing their votes will be rigged, people are gathering at No 10 polling station in Khashuri and are trying to get into the building. Masked people have entered from the back entrance and are now threatening those inside the building.
20:331.10.2012
Election results have been delayed. Results are expected in less than an hour.
20:321.10.2012
As we wait for the CEC to begin releasing the official election results, (in less than 15 minutes) we take a look at to President Saakashvili's speech earlier today.
In a speech on Georgian television on the eve of voting, Saakashvili urged voters to cast their ballots "based on reason and not on emotions." He called election day "a very important and crucial question is to be decided: which country we want to have. And even more, if we want to have our own country at all."
President Mikheil Saakashvili speaks at a polling station during the parliamentary elections in Tbilisi on October 1, 2012.
20:001.10.2012
2,197,173 voters (60.8%) cast ballot in Today's parliamentary elections (CEC). Voter turnout in '08 was 53.9% civil.ge/eng/article.ph…#gvote
Exit polls indicate that the opposition Georgian Dream coalition has received more than 50 percent of the overall vote in the October 1 parliamentary elections.
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, speaking in televised remarks after the polls closed, acknowledged that Georgian Dream had won the party vote. But he said his United National Movement (UNM) was far ahead in the direct elections and would retain its majority in parliament.
