Moon Jae-in, a left-leaning liberal who favours engagement with North Korea, has won South Korea’s presidential election.
The first exit polls after voting closed at 8pm showed Mr Moon had a substantial lead over all other candidates, with 41.4% support.
Tens of millions of citizens flocked to nearly 14,000 polling stations nationwide in what was reported to be a high turnout for an eagerly anticipated snap election to replace scandal-hit former President Park Geun-hye.
Among 13 candidates vying for the job, Moon was forecast to have earned 41.4 percent of the vote compared to conservative rival Hong Joon-pyo’s 23.2 percent, according to the exit poll carried out by broadcasters MBC, KBS and SBS.
The data was released as voting closed at 8 p.m. local time (1100GMT). The winner will not take office until after being officially confirmed on Wednesday morning.
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