Rahmon wins Tajikistan election, extends presidency

DUSHANBE - Tajikistan's incumbent president, Emomali Rahmon, has won 83.6 percent of the vote in the national election and will serve as president for another seven years, preliminary results showed Thursday.

More than 80 percent of all registered voters turned out on Wednesday, said the central election commission. None of the other five candidates managed to gather more than 5 percent of the vote.

According to election laws in Tajikistan, any candidate who collects more than half of the vote wins the election.

The six candidates running in the election were Rahmon, veteran politician from the People's Democratic Party; Alim Babayev from the Economic Reform Party; Talibek Buhariyev from the Agrarian Party; Abduhalim Gaffarov from the Socialist Party; Saidcafar Ismanov from the Democratic Party, and Ismail Talbakov from the Communist Party.

More than 500 international observers also monitored the election.

Tajikistan revised its constitution in 2003 through a national referendum. According to the new constitution, a president serves seven years in one term, but can only serve two terms in a row.