Iran's incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad takes a strong lead of the votes counted so far, the interior ministry said early Saturday.

Of 68 percent of ballot boxes that have been counted as of 3:50 a.m. local time (2320 GMT of Friday), Ahmadinejad won 65.96 percent of the votes, or more than 15 million votes, while his main rival reformist candidate Mir-Housein Mousavi followed with 31.19 percent, or more than 7 million votes, the ministry said in the latest news release.

Iran closed the polling stations at 22:00 p.m. (1730 GMT) on Friday, but voters who have already queued up were allowed to cast their ballots.

Polling stations across Iran opened Friday morning for a closely fought presidential election which pitted Ahmadinejad against three other candidates.

Unprecedented turnout was seen in the 10th presidential election since the victory of the Islamic Revolution in 1979. More than five million voters cast their votes in the first four hours of the election day, while more than 20 million ballots had been cast by 22:00 o'clock when polls closed, according to the Interior Ministry.

The Interior Ministry expected the total turnout to exceed 70 percent, compared with that in the 2005 vote -- some 63 percent in the first round and about 48 percent in the run-off.

(Xinhua News Agency June 13, 2009)