{"id":1176485,"date":"2026-08-30T02:08:19","date_gmt":"2026-08-30T02:08:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1176485\/"},"modified":"2026-08-30T02:08:19","modified_gmt":"2026-08-30T02:08:19","slug":"voting-closes-in-icelands-knife-edge-eu-referendum-elections-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1176485\/","title":{"rendered":"Voting closes in Iceland\u2019s knife-edge EU referendum | Elections News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article__subhead\">Iceland\u2019s leadership has promised to honour whatever the country\u2019s people decide.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"avatar\" tabindex=\"-1\" aria-hidden=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/author\/al_jazeera_staff_150119130629458\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/1788055699_677_2017-06-08T131939Z_1189275883_RC11B0FE7F20_RTRMADP_3_GULF-QATAR-JAZEERA-1714943623.jpg\"   aria-hidden=\"true\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Published On 29 Aug 202629 Aug 2026<\/p>\n<p>Voting has closed in Iceland\u2019s referendum on resuming membership negotiations with the European Union.<\/p>\n<p>Voting stations closed on Saturday, but it could take several hours for a clear victory for either the \u201cyes\u201d or \u201cno\u201d camp to emerge.<\/p>\n<p>Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list<\/p>\n<p>The referendum does not have exit polls, and ballot counting only began once voting stations closed.<\/p>\n<p>Polling suggests the vote is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aljazeera.com\/news\/2026\/8\/29\/why-is-iceland-considering-joining-the-eu\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">on a knife-edge<\/a>, with different surveys putting either side narrowly ahead, but none straying more than a few points from an even 50\/50 split.<\/p>\n<p>The vote comes 13 years after Iceland, then led by a Eurosceptic government, paused EU accession talks.<\/p>\n<p>The country is currently governed by the pro-EU Social Democratic Alliance, which called the vote and promised to honour whatever the Icelandic public decides.<\/p>\n<p>If Icelanders vote \u201cyes\u201d, the country would likely start years of negotiations with Brussels to hammer out membership terms. It would then hold a second referendum on whether to formally become part of the EU.<\/p>\n<p>Security, the relatively sluggish Icelandic economy, and the future of the Icelandic currency, the krona, have all been significant themes in the run-up to the vote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Iceland\u2019s leadership has promised to honour whatever the country\u2019s people decide. Published On 29 Aug 202629 Aug 2026&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1176486,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5174],"tags":[33,2000,299,5187,7059,12],"class_list":["post-1176485","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-eu","tag-elections","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-european","tag-iceland","tag-news"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1176485","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1176485"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1176485\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1176486"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1176485"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1176485"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1176485"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}