Even in a busy year of elections around the world, the coming days stand out.
This coming week, voters will go to the polls in young democracies such as Mauritania and Mongolia, the Islamic Republic of Iran and in stalwart democracies – former imperial powers – Great Britain and France.
While US President Joe Biden and his predecessor Donald Trump were set to hold the first of two televised debates on Thursday before their expected standoff in November, other countries face tough choices.
The votes could reorient the world at a time of war in Europe, the Middle East and Africa; mutual distrust between some major powers; and growing public concern about issues such as jobs, climate change, taxes, inflation and the rise of AI.
This year, national elections will take place in more than fifty countries. India, Mexico and South Africa heralded political changes or ballot box surprises. Russia did not.
Below you can see the hustle and bustle of voting that will take place in the coming days in countries with a combined population of around 225 million in Europe, Africa and Asia:
IRAN
In Iran on Friday, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei is looking for a successor to its hardliner, Chairman Ebrahim Raisiwho died in a helicopter crash last month.
Two hardliners – former nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili and parliament speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf – are among the candidates, including Masoud Pezeshkian, a heart surgeon seen as a reformist who has aligned himself with supporters of relatively moderate former President Hassan Rohani.
Amid signs of widespread voter apathy, Khamenei has called for maximum turnout and issued a veiled warning to Pezeshkian and his allies about relying on the US.
Iran has faced economic problems, partly due to international sanctions after Trump in 2018 tore up Iran’s nuclear deal, struck three earlier with world powers. Iran has since increased its enrichment of uranium and now has enough to produce several nuclear weapons.
The Islamic Republic has sought to position itself as the leader of the Muslim world’s resentment of the West and Israel, which Iran directly attacked for the first time this year. Iran has for years supported a range of militant groups, including the Palestinian Hamas, the Lebanese Hezbollah and the Houthi rebels in Yemen.
FRANCE
France was not supposed to hold national elections this year.
But a drubbing for his pro-business moderate party in the EU elections this month prompted President Emmanuel Macron to dissolve the National Assembly and call early parliamentary elections, to be held in two rounds over the next two Sundays.
The result could send the nuclear-armed nation into uncharted political territory at a turbulent time for Europe: A victory for the anti-immigration National Rally party could produce France’s first far-right government since the Nazi occupation in World War II.
National Rally ranked first among French parties in the EU vote, and opinion polls suggest it could win the largest bloc of seats in the Assembly. If it wins an outright majority, it can appoint 28-year-old party president Jordan Bardella as prime minister.
Macron, whose term ends in 2027, would keep his job but have to share power with a party with historic ties to racism and anti-Semitism, which is strongly opposed to many of his positions, including on military aid to Ukraine.
The outcome of the French vote remains highly uncertain due to the complex two-round system and the alliances that parties can form between the two rounds.
THE UNITED KINGDOM
Western Europe’s other nuclear power, Britain, holds parliamentary elections on Thursday.
Like their neighbors in France, the British appear ready to oust the ruling party: opinion polls suggest the Conservatives are heading for a historic defeat in the House of Commons after fourteen years in power.
On Wednesday, Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Labor leader Keir Starmer struggled to get their messages across. Protesters drowned out their answers at the start of a heated TV debate. They exchanged zingers and barbs on issues such as ethics, taxes and migration.
Britain has been one of the strongest supporters of Ukraine in its national defense against Russia under the Tories and a potential Labor government is not expected to hesitate in such support for Kiev.
Starmer may be inclined to mend Britain’s relationship with the EU after Brexit more than four years ago, but he is adamant that a Labor government will not try to overturn the will of the people in the referendum.
MAURITANIA
Nearly 2 million people will go to the polls on Saturday in Mauritania, a vast desert country in West Africa that positions itself as a strategic ally of the West but has been accused of human rights abuses.
President Mohamed Ould Ghazouani, a former army chief who came to power in 2019 during the country’s first democratic transition, faces seven rivals. They include Biram Dah Abeid, an anti-slavery activist and third-party candidate, and several leaders of opposition parties, as well as a neurosurgeon.
Mauritania, one of the most stable countries in Africa’s arid Sahel region, has seen a number of neighbors rocked by military coups and jihadist violence.
The European Union announced funding this year to help Mauritania tackle people smugglers and deter migrants from making the dangerous Atlantic crossing from West Africa to Europe – numbers of which have risen sharply – and patrol the border with the restive Mali.
In the 1980s, Mauritania became the last country in the world to ban slavery. But according to the Global Slavery Index 2023, nearly 150,000 people – in a country of less than 5 million people – are still affected by modern slavery.
MONGOLIA
Also on Friday is the parliamentary vote in Mongolia, a country with 3.4 million inhabitants that became a democracy in 1990 after about sixty years of communist rule and is sandwiched between two much larger authoritarian states: Russia and China.
Voters will elect representatives to a body expanded to 126 seats, 50 more than in the current term.
The ruling Mongolian People’s Party, which governed the country during the communist era but has transformed into a left-centrist party, is favored to win.
But other parties could make gains, possibly enough to force the People’s Party to form a coalition government with the Democratic Party or the HUN party, a rising player in Mongolian politics.
Dissatisfaction with the government is fueled by allegations of corruption and major protests broke out two years ago.
The Mongolian government has sought to maintain ties with China and Russia while building new ties with the U.S. and its democratic allies — a delicate task as the two sides increasingly clash.
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Associated Press writers Ken Moritsugu in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia; Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates; Monika Pronczuk in Dakar, Senegal; Angela Charlton in Paris and Danica Kirka in London contributed to this report.
