Seoul, June 8 : Hundreds of protesters rallied for a fourth straight day Monday outside a vote-counting facility in Seoul, South Korea, demanding a new election over ballot shortages during last week's local elections.

As of 9:30 a.m., approximately 950 protesters surrounded the SK Olympic Handball Gymnasium in Songpa Ward, according to an unofficial police estimate. Protesters blocked the stadium's 10 entrances to prevent the removal of ballot boxes.

It marked a sharp drop in the number of protesters after around 8,000 people gathered around midnight Sunday, reports Yonhap news agency.

The protests have continued after voting was temporarily suspended at 22 polling stations nationwide on Wednesday due to a lack of ballot papers, according to the National Election Commission (NEC).

Protesters have demanded a re-run of the local elections, with some claiming electoral fraud.

The police have deployed around 350 personnel to the scene to prevent accidental clashes.

As part of an investigation into the ballot shortages, the police said they have secured chat room records of election officials and questioned election workers and people who were unable to cast their ballots due to the shortage.

They also separately called in a civic activist for questioning over a complaint his group filed against senior NEC officials, including its chief, who offered to resign last week, for dereliction of duty over the ballot shortages.

Kim Soon-hwan, secretary general of the group, People's Welfare Countermeasure Committee, called for a thorough probe into the incident as he appeared at the Seoul Gangdong Police Station in eastern Seoul.

The police plan to look into whether the election watchdog properly followed ballot paper distribution standards.

On Sunday, President Lee Jae Myung voiced deep regret over the ballot shortages and ordered the launch of a thorough joint investigation by prosecutors and police into the incident.

/IANS