GOOD MORNING.
Here’s all the news that you need to know as you start your day.
1. Sorting of votes has commenced after ballot boxes around the country opened at 9am to determine who will – and won’t – be making it into the next Dáil.
First results are expected to come in around lunchtime today, but it will be some time before we know the full results of the general election.
Follow our Liveblog to stay across everything as it happens today.
2. The exit poll commissioned by RTÉ, The Irish Times, TG4 and Trinity College Dublin indicates that Sinn Féin, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil have garnered similar levels of support in the election.
Sinn Féin is on 21.1%, Fine Gael is on 21% and Fianna Fáil is on 19.1%.
3. There’s an early election story emerging in the constituency of Limerick City, where there is speculation that votes could be determined void before they are counted.
It has emerged that when voting took place there yesterday, candidates’ names did not appear in alphabetical order on some ballot papers, as required by legislation.
4. International observers of the Syrian civil war have reported that jihadist rebels now control a majority of the city of Aleppo.
The rebels have pressed a lightning offensive against forces of the Iranian- and Russian-backed Syrian government since Wednesday.
5. Kosovo’s Prime Minister Albin Kurti has blamed Serbia for a “terrorist attack” that damaged a canal supplying water to his country’s two main coal-fired power plants.
The incident saw an explosion near the town of Zubin Potok at a canal supplying water to cooling systems at the power plants, which generate most of Kosovo’s electricity.
6. Thousands of demonstrators took to the streets for a second night in Georgia to protest against the government’s decision to suspend negotiations to join the European Union.
Riot police used water cannons after protesters again swarmed the parliament, with some trying to break the metal gates to the building.
7. More accusations have been made against MasterChef presenter Gregg Wallace, who stepped away from hosting the BBC show earlier this week.
New reports emerged last night in news outlets such as The Sun newspaper about other alleged behaviour by the presenter.
8. For anyone looking for a distraction from election counting later, Ireland are set to take on Australia in the last of this year’s November internationals at Lansdowne Road this afternoon.
The match, which kicks off at 3.10pm, will see former Ireland boss Joe Schmidt return to the stadium as a visiting manager for the first time since he left in 2019.
9. It’ll be another relatively mild day today, with mostly cloudy weather, limited sunny spells and highest temperatures of between 12 and 15 degrees Celsius.
There’ll be persistent rain in the west and southwest of the country later this afternoon, which will move north-east as the evening progresses.
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