Tehran, Mar 16 (IANS): The second round of Iran's parliamentary elections will be held on September 11, Abbasali Kadkhodaei, the spokesman for the Guardian Council of Constitution has announced.

The council agreed with the request of the Iranian Ministry of Internal Affairs to postpone the second round of elections over the spread of novel coronavirus, Kadkhodaei was quoted as saying by official IRNA news agency on Sunday.

"The second round of parliamentary elections was to be held on April 17, but it was cancelled," he said.

The 11th parliamentary elections were held on February 21 in Iran, Xinhua reported.

According to Iranian Ministry of Internal Affairs, a total of 24.512 million people, about 42.57 per cent, participated in the elections.

The number of participants in the first round of vote displayed a significant drop of voters compared to the previous election. The 2016 parliamentary election in Iran saw 62 per cent turnout.

In the capital Tehran, only 26.2 per cent of eligible people attended the ballot boxes.

Iran's Ministry of Health and Medical Education announced Sunday that novel coronavirus has affected 13,938 people of whom 724 people have died.

Iran declared the first cases of infection with the COVID-19 in the central city of Qom on February 19.