Afghan election impasse deepens
Afghanistan’s election crisis deepened Sunday as the two presidential candidates sparred over the release of preliminary results and calls mounted for a broader probe of suspect ballots amid allegations of massive fraud.
The impasse has threatened to undermine what the U.S. and its allies had hoped would be the country’s first democratic transfer of authority since Afghan President Hamid Karzai agreed to step down after two terms, as legally required.
Western officials were looking for a smooth transition to show progress ahead of the withdrawal of U.S. and allied combat troops by the end of this year.
Both candidates have promised to sign a security pact with the Obama administration that would allow nearly 10,000 U.S. troops to remain in the country in a training capacity and to conduct counterterrorism operations. A disruption in the announcement of election results could mean another delay in finalizing that agreement, which was rebuffed by Karzai.
Abdullah Abdullah, who garnered the most votes in the first round of voting on April 5 but failed to get the majority needed to win outright, has boycotted the electoral institutions after alleging widespread ballot-box stuffing and other efforts to rig the June 14 run-off vote against him.
His rival, Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, a former finance minister and World Bank official, also filed complaints of irregularities in the balloting but has insisted that the agreed-upon counting process be respected and said any further delays in releasing results would be unacceptable.
Preliminary results had been due on Wednesday, but the Independent Election Commission postponed them for five days saying it needed to audit votes from nearly 2,000 of 23,000 polling stations nationwide. Commission chairman Ahmad Yousuf Nouristani said Sunday that the announcement would be made Monday as planned, although a time had yet to be announced.