Peru faces a presidential runoff as election count drags on after ballot delays

LIMA, Peru (AP) — Peruvians will vote in a presidential runoff in two months after none of the 35 candidates secured an outright victory in the weekend election, though by Tuesday afternoon, the two contenders in the June vote were still unconfirmed.

Electoral authorities continued to count the ballots for a third straight day as authorities were forced to extend voting into Monday after ballots had not been delivered in time to polling stations.

With 77% of ballots tallied, official results on Tuesday showed Keiko Fujimori, the conservative daughter of a disgraced former president, leading the count with 16.86% of the votes, while Rafael López Aliaga, the ultraconservative former mayor of Peru’s capital, Lima, earned 12.66%.

Jorge Nieto Montesinos was close in the third place, with 11.74% of the vote, maintaining a narrow chance of making it into the June 7 runoff.

The sluggish pace of the count mirrored Peru’s 2021 presidential election, a contest where final tallies weren't completed until five days after polls closed.

A presidential candidate needs more than 50% of votes to win outright. The two candidates with the most votes in a first round advance to the runoff. The winner will be Peru’s ninth president in just 10 years.

A European Union election observation mission said Tuesday it didn't see “sufficient grounds” supporting claims of fraud, following allegations by López Aliaga, who described the election — without providing evidence — as a “fraud of a kind unique in the world.”

The election has been mired with logistical issues that left thousands in the country and abroad unable to cast ballots. That prompted authorities to allow more than 52,000 residents of Lima to vote on Monday. The extension, announced after vote counting had begun Sunday evening, also covered Peruvians registered to vote in Orlando, Florida, and Paterson, New Jersey.

“I’m fed up,” Iris Valle, 56, said as she waited to vote on Monday at a public school in Lima, the country's capital. She feared that her employer would cut her pay for not showing up early, because she had to fulfill her voting obligation.

Voting is mandatory for Peruvians from the ages of 18 to 70. Failure to vote comes with a fine of up to $32.

The election took place amid a surge in violent crime and corruption that has fueled widespread discontent among voters, who largely view candidates as dishonest and unprepared for the presidency.

Peru’s economy, however, has defied both the crime surge and the political instability stemming from a revolving door of presidents, having had three since last October alone. Aided by its status as one of the world’s largest copper producers, the country posted more than 3% growth in 2024 and 2025, though that’s lower than the 5%-6% annual growth it saw in the 2000s.

Will Freeman, a fellow for Latin American Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, explained that the independence of the country’s central bank has also contributed to economic growth.

“Although Peru has had all these presidents, it has had only one central bank president since the mid-2000s, Julio Velarde,” Freeman said. “He’s been a real source of stability and given investors some confidence that there is an institutional core that remains from one presidency to the next in Peru.”

Still, Freeman warned, Peru can't afford to be complacent as current growth is lower than the 5%-6% annual rates the country saw in the 2000s and recent congressional decisions point to “a more conservative economic populism.”

In her fourth bid for the presidency, Fujimori has promised to crack down on crime but has also defended laws that experts say make it difficult to prosecute criminals. The laws, which her party backed in recent years, eliminated preliminary detention in certain cases and raised the threshold for seizing criminal assets.

If elected, she has said that judges presiding over criminal cases will be anonymous and prisoners will have to work to earn their food.

Meanwhile, López Aliaga has proposed building prisons in the country’s Amazon region, and lobbied for allowing judges to conceal their identities and expelling foreigners who are living illegally in Peru.

For the first time in more than 30 years, voters were also asked to choose members of a bicameral Congress, following recent legislative reforms that concentrate significant power in the new upper chamber.

Associated Press writer Regina Garcia Cano in Caracas, Venezuela, contributed to this report.

Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america

Rafael Lopez Aliaga, presidential candidate of the Popular Renewal party, speaks to supporters as electoral authorities continue to count the ballots two days after general elections in Lima, Peru, Tuesday, April 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)

Keiko Fujimori, presidential candidate of the Popular Force party, departs a polling station after voting during general elections in Lima, Peru, Sunday, April 12, 2026. (AP Photo/Gerardo Marin)

Voters line up as voting resumes at a polling stations affected by delays during general elections in Lima, Peru, Monday, April 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia)

A woman votes as polling resumes at a station affected by delays and logistical problems during general elections in Lima, Peru, Monday, April 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia)

An election official checks voter lists as voting resumes at polling stations affected by delays and logistical problems during general elections in Lima, Peru, Monday, April 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)

Voters check the rolls as voting in the general election resumes at polling stations affected by delays and logistical problems in Lima, Peru, Monday, April 13, 2026. (AP Photo/Guadalupe Pardo)

NEW DELHI (AP) — A fire broke out at a hotel in Kolkata in the early hours Wednesday, killing at least nine people and injuring six in the capital of India’s West Bengal state, police said.

The blaze erupted around 1:45 a.m. at a hotel in central Kolkata close to the West Bengal Fire Department headquarters, the Press Trust of India news agency reported.

Five fire engines were deployed to bring the blaze under control, while police and disaster management teams carried out rescue operations, the report said. The injured were taken to a nearby hospital for treatment.

Firefighters struggled to reach people trapped on the upper floors as thick smoke engulfed the building, a police officer told the news agency. The fire was brought under control, the officer said.

Authorities said their immediate focus was on rescuing anyone still trapped inside and investigating the cause of the fire, which was not immediately known.

Nine people have been confirmed dead but the toll could rise, police told PTI.

Deadly fires, often linked to electrical faults or gas cylinder explosions, are common in India where investigators have frequently pointed to safety lapses and inadequate enforcement of fire regulations as contributing to recurring loss of life.

On Monday, a blaze at a hotel in West Bengal’s temple town of Tarapith left at least seven people dead and several others critically injured.

In December, at least 25 people were killed after a fire ripped through a popular nightclub in western Goa state.

Policemen and other officials stand near a hotel which caught fire early Wednesday in Kolkata, India, Wednesday, Aug. 19, 2026. (AP Photo/Bikas Das)