Recount ordered at 10 pct of Afghan vote sites

[March 19, 2010]  KABUL (AP) -- A U.N.-backed monitoring body ordered Afghanistan's election commission to recount ballots from about 10 percent of the country's polling stations because of suspicious totals in last month's presidential vote, an official said Tuesday.

The recount order raises the possibility that President Hamid Karzai's lead could drop below the 50 percent threshold, forcing the country to hold a second-round runoff between Karzai and top challenger Abdullah Abdullah.

More than 2,500 polling sites from the Aug. 20 presidential election will need to be recounted, said Grant Kippen, the head of the Electoral Complaints Commission, a U.N.-backed body headed by three international and two Afghan commissioners.

Massive allegations of fraud have tainted the country's second-ever direct presidential vote. Last week the ECC ordered Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission, the body in charge of the election, to recount and audit ballot boxes from stations that had 100 percent turnout or where a candidate received more than 95 percent of the valid votes.

The number of stations affected by the order turned out to be more than 2,500, Kippen said. There were about 26,300 polling stations across Afghanistan on election day.

The most serious allegations of fraud have been lodged in southern Afghanistan, where Karzai would expect strong support from his fellow ethnic Pashtuns, though Kippen said that all provinces were affected by the order to recount the 2,500 sites.

The ECC has already thrown out ballots from 83 polling stations because of fraud allegations, all in areas of support for Karzai.

The country's election commission originally hoped to declare a certified winner this week, but claims of ballot-stuffing and phantom voters have pushed that timeline back weeks, leaving the country in political limbo at a time the Taliban is unleashing a record number of attacks.

Thousands of fake ballots were submitted across the country, and returns showed Karzai winning 100 percent of the vote in some districts.

The most recent partial count of the preliminary results has Karzai leading with 54 percent to former foreign minister Abdullah's 28 percent. If enough votes are eliminated for fraud complaints, Karzai's tally could fall below the 50-percent threshold, forcing a two-man runoff. The current results reflect 93 percent of polling stations, with 5 percent of the votes still to be counted and the remaining 2 percent quarantined for suspected fraud.

Grant said it was not clear how much longer the ECC and IEC would need to complete the fraud investigations and recounts, though he has hinted that weeks of work remain.

"We need to be thorough about the job that we need to do," he said.

[Associated Press; By JASON STRAZIUSO]

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