Peru’s electoral board calls for audit of election

Peru’s National Jury of Elections (JNE) on Saturday requested a “comprehensive and exhaustive IT audit” of the results of the general elections held on April 12, it said in a statement. The final results of the first round of the elections remain unclear and the vote count is still incomplete with 97.5% of the ballots counted. No clear presidential rival has emerged to face conservative frontrunner Keiko Fujimori in a June run-off. The JNE called for the independent audit “as a concrete and decisive step to strengthen the transparency, integrity, and reliability of the election results,” the statement said. Left-wing congressman Roberto Sanchez and ultra-conservative Rafael Lopez Aliaga remain deadlocked for second place, separated by roughly 28,000 votes, as disputed tally sheets from more than 1 million ballots are being reviewed in hopes of ascertaining the results. A spokesperson for the JNE told Reuters that a possible audit would not interrupt the review of the contested