DAMASCUS (Sputnik) — On February 22, Syrian President Bashar Assad issued a decree calling for parliamentary elections in the country on April 13. In late March, Assad told Sputnik in an interview that no major changes were expected in the country’s parliament after elections under current conditions.
"A large number of candidates have submitted documents, their number originally surpassed 11,500. But by the Election Day, some 3,500 candidates remain who will compete for 250 seats in the people's Assembly," Hisham Shaar said.
According to the official, some 7,000 polling stations across the country will open up at 7:00 a.m. local time (04:00 GMT).
"The polling stations will open everywhere apart from the provinces of Idlib and Raqqa which are not controlled by the government," Shaar said about the regions controlled by Daesh and al-Nusra Front.
The Wednesday parliamentary elections will be the second held in the country since the beginning of the civil war in 2011. The latest parliamentary elections were held in May 2012, with voter turnout exceeding 51 percent, which is equal to some five million people, according to Syria's electoral committee.
