What to look out for in Ireland’s general election – with counting under way
Counting is under way in Ireland’s general election.
But unlike the UK, it will take more than a few hours for all 174 seats to be filled – and much longer for a government to be formed.
Here’s three things you should look out for as the votes are being counted.
A first preference vote for Sinn Fein leader Mary Lou McDonlad as ballot papers are counted at RDS Simmonscourt, Dublin. Pic: PA
1. The main parties’ race to 88
That’s the number needed for a majority in Ireland‘s lower house of parliament, the Dail.
But the three largest parties – Fianna Fail (FF), Fine Gael (FG) and Sinn Finn (SF) – have not fielded enough candidates to reach this, so they will be on the hunt for coalition partners.
In the last election, FF won 38 seats, SF picked up 37 and FG won 35 with much the same support that Friday’s exit poll suggests.
Ballots being counted this morning. Pic: PA
Count verifiers look on as counting takes place in Dublin. Pic: PA
The centre-right Fianna Fail and Fine Gael, who ruled in the last government with the Green Party, have vowed not to enter a coalition with the left-wing Sinn Fein.
So if the exit poll closely mirrors the final result, a FF-FG coalition looks likely – along with another party or independent candidates.
Explainer: How Ireland’s election voting system works
But if Sinn Fein translates their support into significantly more seats than they picked up last time, it would put the party in a stronger negotiating position – and Mary Lou McDonald could still have an outside chance of becoming Ireland’s first female taoiseach.
2. How the smaller parties fare
Ireland’s electoral system – proportional representation by single transferable vote – means smaller parties pick up more seats than their UK counterparts.
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Meet Ireland’s first-time voters
On the left, there is Labour, the Social Democrats, the Greens – all on between 4% and 6% in the exit poll – as well as the People Before Profit-Solidarity alliance.
On the right, there is SF breakaway party Aontu and several newly formed far-right parties, the largest of which is Independent Ireland.
Read more: How Trump looms over Ireland’s election
At least one of these groups is likely to form a government with FF and FG – depending on how many seats they pick up.
3. How the independent candidates perform
A quirk of Ireland’s electoral system is the high number of independent candidates.
The exit poll put independents at 14.6% – meaning they are likely to win a significant number of seats. In 2020, independent candidates picked up 19 seats with 12.2% of the vote.
It’s likely that a three-party coalition will still fall short of reaching the 88-seat threshold for a majority, so support from independents will become important.
In 2016, nine independents were members of the Fine Gael-led minority government, with three holding ministerial posts.
The independents come from across the ideological spectrum and often focus on hyper-local issues.
Donald Trump has agreed to send “top of the line weapons” to NATO to support Ukraine – and threatened Russia with “severe” tariffs if it doesn’t agree to end the war.
Speaking with NATO secretary general Mark Rutte during a meeting at the White House, the US president said: “We’ve made a deal today where we are going to be sending them weapons, and they’re going to be paying for them.
“This is billions of dollars worth of military equipment which is going to be purchased from the United States,” he added, “going to NATO, and that’s going to be quickly distributed to the battlefield.”
Weapons being sent include surface-to-air Patriot missile systems and batteries, which Ukraine has asked for to defend itself from Russian air strikes.
Pic: Reuters
Mr Trump also said he was “very unhappy” with Russia, and threatened “severe tariffs” of “about 100%” if there isn’t a deal to end the war in Ukraine within 50 days.
The White House added that the US would put “secondary sanctions” on countries that buy oil from Russia if an agreement was not reached.
It comes after weeks of frustration from Mr Trump against Vladimir Putin’s refusal to agree to an end to the conflict, with the Russian leader telling the US president he would “not back down” from Moscow’s goals in Ukraine at the start of the month.
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Trump says Putin ‘talks nice and then bombs everybody’
During the briefing on Monday, Mr Trump said he had held calls with Mr Putin where he would think “that was a nice phone call,” but then “missiles are launched into Kyiv or some other city, and that happens three or four times”.
“I don’t want to say he’s an assassin, but he’s a tough guy,” he added.
Earlier this year, Mr Trump told Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy “you’re gambling with World War Three” in a fiery White House meeting, and suggested Ukraine started the war against Russia as he sought to negotiate an end to the conflict.
After Mr Trump’s briefing, Russian senator Konstantin Kosachev said on Telegram: “If this is all that Trump had in mind to say about Ukraine today, then all the steam has gone out.”
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Meanwhile, Mr Zelenskyy met with US special envoy Keith Kellogg in Kyiv, where they “discussed the path to peace” by “strengthening Ukraine’s air defence, joint production, and procurement of defence weapons in collaboration with Europe”.
He thanked both the envoy for the visit and Mr Trump “for the important signals of support and the positive decisions for both our countries”.
At least 30 people have been killed in the Syrian city of Sweida in clashes between local military groups and tribes, according to Syria’s interior ministry.
Officials say initial figures suggest around 100 people have also been injured in the city, where the Druze faith is one of the major religious groups.
The interior ministry said its forces will directly intervene to resolve the conflict, which the Reuters news agency said involved fighting between Druze gunmen and Bedouin Sunni tribes.
It marks the latest episode of sectarian violence in Syria, where fears among minority groups have increased since Islamist-led rebels toppled President Bashar al Assad in December, installing their own government and security forces.
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In March, Sky’s Stuart Ramsay described escalating violence within Syria
The violence reportedly erupted after a wave of kidnappings, including the abduction of a Druze merchant on Friday on the highway linking Damascus to Sweida.
Last April, Sunni militia clashed with armed Druze residents of Jaramana, southeast of Damascus, and fighting later spread to another district near the capital.
But this is the first time the fighting has been reported inside the city of Sweida itself, the provincial capital of the mostly Druze province.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reports the fighting was centred in the Maqwas neighbourhood east of Sweida and villages on the western and northern outskirts of the city.
It adds that Syria’s Ministry of Defence has deployed military convoys to the area.
Western nations, including the US and UK, have been increasingly moving towards normalising relations with Syria.
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UK aims to build relationship with Syria
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Read more from Sky News:
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Concerns among minority groups have intensified following the killing of hundreds of Alawites in March, in apparent retaliation for an earlier attack carried out by Assad loyalists.
That was the deadliest sectarian flare-up in years in Syria, where a 14-year civil war ended with Assad fleeing to Russia after his government was overthrown by rebel forces.
The city of Sweida is in southern Syria, about 24 miles (38km) north of the border with Jordan.
The man convicted of the murder of British student Meredith Kercher has been charged with sexual assault against an ex-girlfriend.
Rudy Guede, 38, was the only person who was definitively convicted of the murder of 21-year-old Ms Kercher in Perugia, Italy, back in 2007.
He will be standing trial again in November after an ex-girlfriend filed a police report in the summer of 2023 accusing Guede of mistreatment, personal injury and sexual violence.
Guede, from the Ivory Coast, was released from prison for the murder of Leeds University student Ms Kercher in 2021, after having served about 13 years of a 16-year sentence.
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Since last year – when this investigation was still ongoing – Guede has been under a “special surveillance” regime, Sky News understands, meaning he was banned from having any contact with the woman behind the sexual assault allegations, including via social media, and had to inform police any time he left his city of residence, Viterbo, as ruled by a Rome court.
Guede has been serving a restraining order and fitted with an electronic ankle tag.
The Kercher murder case, in the university city of Perugia, was the subject of international attention.
Ms Kercher, a 21-year-old British exchange student, was found murdered in the flat she shared with her American roommate, Amanda Knox.
The Briton’s throat had been cut and she had been stabbed 47 times.
(L-R) Raffaele Sollecito, Meredith Kercher and Amanda Knox. File pic: AP
Ms Knox and her then-boyfriend, Raffaele Sollecito, were placed under suspicion.
Both were initially convicted of murder, but Italy’s highest court overturned their convictions, acquitting them in 2015.
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