Voting for Turkey’s May 14 presidential and parliamentary elections begins today for Turks living abroad, and 1.5 million Turks, the largest Turkish community abroad, are set to vote in Germany.

Voting abroad will be possible until May 9, and 26 polling stations have opened in Germany alone.

In the 2018 Turkish by-elections, Germany found itself at the center of a heated controversy, with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to accuse the German authorities of obstructing his election campaign efforts in the country.

Such tensions are not expected this time.

After 20 years in power, Erdogan is facing his toughest electoral challenge to date. Recent polls are predicting a head-to-head battle between the outgoing president and Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the leader of a coalition of opposition parties.

A runoff between the top two in the first round of the presidential election will take place on May 28, unless the May 14 vote produces a winner with more than 50% of the vote.