Election day in Europe

Danish politician Morten Messerschmidt didn't expect a surprise like this. Forecasts put his right-wing populist People's Party (Dansk Folkeparti) in front, with 23.1 percent, followed by the ruling Social Democrats, with 20.5 percent.

Two women in southern Germany cast their votes decked out in traditional Black Forest garb. In Germany, 64.4 million people are eligible to vote, including nearly three million citizens of other EU countries. Forty-eight percent voted, significantly more than the 43.3 percent who did so in 2009.

Two activists from the feminist group Femen used their bodies to express their concerns at a polling station in northern France. With their symbolic vaccination campaign against fascism, the women were protesting against the far-right National Front. Exit polls said the party won around 25 percent in the French election, putting it in first place.

This young boy accompanied his mother to an Athens voting booth. Exit polls in Greece indicated the Coalition of the Radical Left (Syriza) made the strongest showing at the polls, earning 26 to 30 percent. The third-biggest winner appears to have been the right-wing extremists of Golden Dawn, with eight to 10 percent. The party gained greater numbers of adherents as a result of the euro crisis.

An elderly Warsaw couple fills out their ballots together. By midday, only 7.3 percent of Poland's eligible voters had made it to the polls. Turnout was also low in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Heinz-Christian Strache, party leader chair of the FPÖ, saw his party boosted. Exit polls suggested the right-wing populists won around 20 percent of the vote - significantly more than in the last EU election (12.7 percent). In their campaigns, the FPÖ used populistic slogans against both immigration and aid for EU states in crisis.

These two nuns took voting into their own hands. Italy could rack up a negative record in voter turnout this time around. By midday, only 16 percent of the roughly 50 million voters had cast a ballot. Five years ago, midday turnout had reached 30 percent.

Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy was one of a minority in Spain who actually went to the polls. The crisis-stricken country recorded historically low turnout. By midday, only 23.89 percent had voted. In the 2009 elections, 24.10 percent had done so by the same time of day.