Oct. 2 (Bloomberg) -- Three women won in Bahrain’s special parliamentary elections held on Sept. 24 and Oct. 1, bringing their total number in the 40-seat assembly to four.

State-run Bahrain News Agency reported late yesterday that two female candidates won in yesterday’s run-off elections while a third won uncontested before the first round of elections that was held on Sept. 24. The fourth candidate was elected in the October 2010 polls.

The ballots were held to fill 18 seats vacated by lawmakers from al-Wefaq group, the biggest Shiite Muslim party, who quit in protest at a crackdown on mostly Shiite demonstrators earlier this year. Al-Wefaq boycotted the elections. It was not clear how many of the new 18 lawmakers are Shiite.

--Editors: Digby Lidstone, Louis Meixler.

To contact the reporter on this story: Donna Abu-Nasr in Manama at dabunasr@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Andrew J. Barden at barden@bloomberg.net.