The Palestinian Central Elections Committee announced on Thursday that 10 candidates, including seven independents, were qualified to run in the Jan. 9 presidential election.

Rami Hamdallah, chief of the committee, made the announcement at a news conference in Ramallah following the midnight deadline for registration.

Altogether 12 Palestinians had applied to run in the election, said Hamdallah, adding that 10 of them had met with all the conditions stipulated by the election law.

According to the law, an eligible candidate should be more than 35 years old, register in the registration center, present the needed documents and the signatures of 5,000 supporters, and deposit 3,000 US dollars to the Committee.

The following are the 10 candidates slated to run in the election:

Mahmoud Abbas, Fatah candidate

Basam al Salhi, People's Party candidate

Tayseer Khaled, Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine candidate

Marwan Barghouti, independent candidate

Hassan Khreisha, independent candidate

Abdel Sattar Qassem, independent candidate

Abdel Kareem Shubeir, independent candidate

Abdel Halim al Ashqar, independent candidate

Sayed Baraka, independent candidate

Mustafa al Barghouti, independent candidate