Le Pen pulls ahead in French presidential election: Interim results

French far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen garnered 27.96% of the vote in the first round of the election on Sunday, interim official results published by the Interior Ministry showed.

She was followed by incumbent Emmanuel Macron on 26.39%, with hard-left contender Jean-Luc Melenchon far behind on 18.26% and far-right Eric Zemmour on 6.66%, with 45% of the ballots counted.

President Emmanuel Macron thanked the leftist and conservative camps for backing his reelection bid after the first round of voting showed him tied with right-winger Marine Le Pen.

"I thank [Socialist] Anne Hidalgo, [conservative] Valerie Pecresse, and [Communist] Fabien Roussel for lending me their support tonight," he said in a post-vote speech.

The first official results put Macron in second place with 26.67%. With 50% of the ballots counted, Le Pen is leading the race with 27.53% of the vote.

Le Pen, who has been backed by right-wing Eric Zemmour and Nicolas Dupont-Aignan, said she would be the president of all the French if she won the runoff on April 24. (ANI/Sputnik)

( With inputs from ANI )