Northern Ireland voted on Wednesday in an election that could allow the return of a government shared between Protestants and Catholics and help cement a lasting political settlement after decades of conflict.
Britain and Ireland hope the assembly election will lead to a power-sharing agreement by March 26 and have threatened to impose indefinite direct rule from London with more input from Dublin if there is no deal by the deadline.
A 1998 peace deal ended 30 years of conflict in which 3,600 people were killed, but there is still no agreement on how the province should be run between Protestants who want to maintain union with Britain and Catholics seeking a united Ireland. The last 108-member assembly did not even manage to sit for a whole day after it was elected in 2003.
The parties expected to do best are the largest Protestant grouping, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) of firebrand preacher Ian Paisley, and Sinn Fein, political wing of the Irish Republican Army (IRA). Polling stations opened at 7 am (0700 GMT) and will close at 10 pm, though the count will not start until Thursday.
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