General Election Results in Latvia: AS Party Finished the Election Leading

According to the data on the website of the Latvian Central Election Commission, 99.9 percent of the votes cast in yesterday's general elections were counted. According to the inconclusive election results, 6 political formations were entitled to enter the parliament by passing the 5 percent election threshold.

AS, led by Prime Minister Kulbergs, who received 35.29 percent of the votes counted, will come first and be represented with 42 deputies in the 100-seat parliament. With this result, AS reached the highest number of seats won by a single political formation in the history of the Latvian Parliament (Saeima).

The Latvia First Party (LPV), where Ainars Slesers is the prime minister candidate, received 13.09 percent of the votes, and the Sovereign Power and Young Latvians Union (SV/AJ) received 11.72 percent. The National Alliance (NA) came in fourth place with 8.9 percent of the votes, and the Progressives (P) came in fifth place with 7.8 percent of the votes.

The New Union (JV) party, which received 6.34 percent of the votes, will decline from its "largest political formation" position in the current parliament to its "smallest political formation" position in the new parliament. According to the latest data, 807 thousand 67 people voted in the country where there are 1 million 557 thousand 615 registered voters, thus the participation rate in the elections was 51.8 percent.

Prime Minister Kulbergs, in his statement to journalists, stated that the election results show that the people want change and that they need a strong representation in the parliament and government to implement this change.

Kulbergs, who vowed to continue support for Ukraine and maintain his tough stance against Russia, said: "Any economic ties with Russia will weaken us. Yes, it may provide some additional income, but this is a weakness that Russia can exploit." he said.

Experts speaking to Latvia's public broadcaster LSM highlighted the triple coalition option among the options to form a new government.

Experts pointed out that Kulbergs' party has a common stance with the NA and JV parties on pro-NATO and European Union policies, increasing defense spending, continuing support for Ukraine, continuing sanctions against Russia and strengthening the eastern border. While the official election results are expected to be approved by October 12, the first session of the new parliament is planned to be held on November 3.