Delayed manual vote count to finalize Honduras electoral results begins

Staff members of presidential candidate Nasry Asfura of Honduras' National Party participate in the recount of electoral records two weeks after the presidential election, as voting remains stalled amid uncounted ballots, accusations of fraud and electoral system failures, in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, December 17, 2025. REUTERS/Leonel Estrada

TEGUCIGALPA, Dec ‌18 - The Honduran ‌electoral council on Thursday ‌started a delayed, manual count of tally sheets containing ‍hundreds of thousands ‍of votes ‌of the Central American nation's ‍November ​30 presidential election.

The electoral ⁠council has said that the votes ‌now being revised showed ⁠inconsistencies and ‍were therefore excluded from the initial count.

Adding ‍those ballots to ‌the overall count could overturn conservative Nasry Asfura's razor-thin lead. Asfura is currently ahead of center-right candidate Salvador Nasralla ‌by just 43,000 votes - out of more than 3 ​million cast.

(Reporting by Laura Garcia; Editing by Kylie Madry)