Cuba reports high election turn-out

Over 82 per cent of Cubans had voted in the country's one-party elections four hours after polling stations opened on Sunday, the Cuban news agency Prensa Latina reported.

"Over 6,595,000 Cubans, including President Fidel Castro, voted by 1100 hours (1600 gmt) today," the agency said.

"This represents 82.88 per cent of the voters registered for Sunday's general elections." Polling stations close at 1800 hours (2300 gmt), and statistics on the total number of votes are expected after about 2000 hours (0100 gmt), the agency said.

Official results will be known on Monday afternoon.

BBC Monitoring (http://www.monitor.bbc.co.uk), based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.