divided over whether or not to join the EU early election results in mdova show 50% of ballots voting in favor of setting EU membership as a goal for the country people there were voting in that referendum but also for their next president incumbent Pro euu Maya Sandu says there was unprecedented interference in the election she came out on top for the presidential vote but not with the 50% needed to avoid a second round runoff here she is speaking about the elections criminal groups working together with foreign forces hostile to our national interest have attacked our country with tens of millions of Euros lies and propaganda we have clear evidence that these criminal groups aim to buy 300,000 votes a fraud of unprecedented SC well we can speak now to our correspondent Maria nicolescu G to find out a bit more Maria firstly on the referendum about the EU membership it looks like the country very very split on that issue pretty much 50/50 is it yes it's an extremely tight uh race for this referendum after the first preliminary results last night had shown the referendum failing with around 54% of against voted this estimation remain remained such for a few hours but then during the night uh the results of the diaspora started trickling in tipping the balance and currently there are about 50% of votes on both sides with 98% of votes counted so far the difference is going to be made by a a few hundred voters only what we know so far for sure is that the majority of citizens inside of mdova uh chose to vote no in this EU referendum but the diaspora massively voted yes with over 75% of ballots in favor EU accession whatever the result this shows once again how divided the movan population is on the issue surrounding the European Union this vote also comes after an aggressive meddling c campaign by Russia who's tried to influence the vote to ensure that the referendum fails during the night president Maya Sandu who's made EU integration one of the main topics of her mandate accused um organized CRI criminal groups of attacking mdova and she said that 300,000 votes were actually bought and she's referring here to Russian interference orchestrated by fugitive oligarch Elan Shore earlier this month the movan police had already confirmed that 130,000 movans were paid through Russian Banks um in order to vote no in the referendum okay a payoff for votes but also a a no among those that voted within her own country the incumbent President coming out on top when it come to the presidential polls even if not getting that 50% Maria yes a much less tied presidential race Maya Sandu wins the first round with a a bit over 40% of votes more or less as was expected um she's followed by Alexander stogo who has 26% of votes uh so far he's the candidate for the Socialist for the moldovan Socialist party led by former president Igor Igor dodon who's known for his ties with Russia and the Kremlin Alexander stanlo also said that he boycotted the referendum a second round of this presidential race will be held on November 3rd it could be a tight race as well most of the nine other candidates are opposed to Mayas Sandu and so they could call um they could choose to support Alexander stano oligarch Elan Shore who is the pro-russian opp opposition voice and the voice of Russian interference here in mdova had called citizens to vote for anyone but Sandu but the referendum could also be a wakeup call for those who support Maya sandu's pro- European STS and who didn't go out to vote on Sunday the yesterday's voter turnout lied around 51.6% okay Maria for now thanks very much indeed
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