Voters in DR Congo are choosing their leaders in elections marred by violence and logistical difficulties.
At least four people have died after gunmen attacked polling stations in the second city, Lubumbashi, officials say.
Voting has been delayed in some areas because of a lack of ballot papers in polls contested by President Joseph Kabila and 10 other candidates.
It is the second election since the end of successive wars which left some four million people dead.
At least three people were killed on Saturday in election clashes, leading to a police ban on final campaign rallies in this mineral-rich country, which is two-thirds the size of Western Europe.
Ahead of the vote, international organisations appealed for calm.
Etienne Tshisekedi, 78, seen as the strongest opposition candidate, has accused President Kabila, 40, of planning to rig the election.
Some 22,000 UN peacekeepers are stationed around the country and are expected to help prevent any outbreaks of violence.
Election officials have been scrambling to get ballot papers distributed to all 60,000 of the polling stations in this vast country which has very little transport infrastructure.
In many inaccessible areas, voting material was delivered by helicopter.
Despite calls for the election to be delayed to give time to improve the preparations, election officials said on Sunday that everything was 99% ready.
Polling stations opened at 0600 local time. Because of the time difference in this continent-sized country, this was 0400 GMT in eastern areas and an hour later in the west.
The BBC’s Mamadou Moussa Ba in the south-eastern mining capital of Lubumbashi says gunmen – suspected to belong to a secessionist movement – attacked two polling stations in the city.
But the AFP news agency quotes a military spokesman as saying that two policeman and a civilian were killed and two soldiers wounded.
“The two police were killed at point blank range and a female voter was hit by a deadly stray bullet,” the spokesman is quoted as saying.
He also said that some attackers had been killed.
“I can’t say how many, we are collecting the bodies.”
The governor of the local Katanga province, Moise Katumbi, told Reuters news agency that three attackers had been killed and seven arrested.
Two vehicles carrying election materials were also attacked overnight just outside Lubumbashi, our reporter says.
The attackers wounded one driver and a security officer and set voting material on fire, election officials said.
Our reporter says there are lengthy delays at some polling stations, which had failed to open six hours after voting was due to start, although polling began on time in other areas.
The BBC’s Christophe Pons in Kinshasa says all the voting material is in place at the polling stations he has visited and the election is proceeding smoothly although not many voters are braving the heavy rains.
However, the AP news agency reports that voting has been delayed due to a lack of ink in some areas, while some voters have told the BBC they have been unable to cast their ballots – either because they cannot find their names on the electoral register, or because someone had already voted in their place.
As well as the 11 presidential candidates, more than 18,000 are vying for seats in the 500-member parliament.
In some areas, the ballot paper runs to several pages and resembles a newspaper because there are so many parliamentary candidates.
This is likely to cause some confusion in a country where one-third of adults cannot read or write.
Following Saturday’s violence, police blocked Mr Tshisekedi at Kinshasa airport for seven hours on Sunday to prevent him going ahead with a rally.
The European Union observer mission criticised both the police and the various candidates over the pre-election violence.
Delaying Mr Tshisekedi from leaving the airport had been “a serious impediment” to his right to campaign, the mission said.
The United Nations too, criticised the security forces.
“The security forces should refrain from any acts that could heighten tensions and create any difficulties on the eve of elections,” Reuters news agency quoted Mounoubai Madnodje, spokesman for the UN peacekeeping mission in DR Congo, as saying.
The last election, in 2006, was marred by weeks of street battles led by supporters of the losing candidate, Jean-Pierre Bemba.
A former rebel leader, he is now on trial at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
BBC East Africa correspondent Will Ross says that whether it is peaceful or not this time will depend to a great extent on the behaviour of the candidates and whether the losers are willing to accept defeat.
[ZNBC]
