ASTANA (AFP) - President Nursultan Nazarbayev's party claimed victory in parliamentary elections in the central Asian state of Kazakhstan, the party's deputy chairman said.
"According to our preliminary information and partly that of the central election commission, we won a decisive victory. We will have no less than 60 percent of seats" in the 77-seat parliament, said Amangeldy Ermegiyev of the Otan party.
The central electoral commission had not yet announced official results of the poll, which critics slammed over the introduction of a barely tested electronic voting system, a lack of transparency and the opposition's lack of access to the media.
The Otan party, however, rejected criticism by international monitors such as the OSCE security and rights group, claiming that the vote went "according to international standards."
"The election confirmed that this is the party of the president and of the people. We are the party of real action and protect the interests of the people," Ermegiyev told reporters.
Preliminary results showed that 56 percent of the country's 8.5 million voters had turned out for Sunday's elections to the 77-seat lower house of parliament, or majilis -- a usually compliant institution whose powers Nazarbayev had promised to increase after the election.
Sixty-seven of the seats were to be allotted on a constituency basis and 10 on the basis of party lists.
The 64-year-old Nazarbayev was Kazakshtan's last Soviet-era president and has clung on through a series of referendums and elections criticised by the West as flawed.