Karzai Rival Refuses To Concede

Hamid Karzai's closest rival in Afghanistan's landmark election insisted Sunday he has a chance for victory, saying Karzai's commanding lead was based on early results and the election could turn on an investigation of fraud allegations.

Former Education Minister Yunus Qanooni told the Associated Press that he was preparing to be in the political opposition as the country moves toward Western-style democracy — though he added that whether he recognizes the results depends on the honesty of the probe into fraud complaints.

Preliminary returns from the Oct. 9 election put Karzai on course for a landslide in a vote supposed to cement Afghanistan's post-Taliban stabilization. Of the 595,000 votes tallied by Sunday morning, the U.S.-backed Karzai had received almost 64 percent.

That puts Karzai — who was installed as a transitional president when the ruling Taliban was ousted by a U.S. invasion in 2001 — on course for the simple majority needed to avoid a run-off, though only about 7 percent of the total ballots cast have been counted so far.

Qanooni, who has about 17 percent of the vote, said "the figures will change" in his favor as more ballots are counted. Election officials also have cautioned against calling the election too soon.

He also pointed to fraud allegations made by him and others of Karzai's 15 opponents. "If there was no cheating, I can tell you that I would be the winner," he said.

Karzai's opponents have complained of cheating to a panel of foreign experts created after a threatened boycott of results from Afghanistan's first direct election ever. The allegations center around ballot box stuffing, intimidation and the ink used at some polling stations to mark voters' hands — which was supposed to be indelible to prevent repeated voting but proved to be easily washed off.

The three-member panel has promised to examine the candidates' 100 complaints, though it is unclear whether they will report before the election result is announced.

A dozen tribal leaders gathered at Qanooni's spacious Kabul home Sunday and told of alleged ballot box stuffing, sometimes with the collusion of police and local government officials.

Qanooni said he "wouldn't mind" if a few hundred extra ballots were added, but he insisted there was evidence that groups of ballot boxes were emptied and refilled with voting slips marked for Karzai.

The joint U.N.-Afghan election body acknowledges that boxes arrived at counting centers with their seals broken, but officials insist the damage was due to rough handling. Election observers reported no serious infringements.

Qanooni said his recognition of the vote depended on the panel's report and whether the election commission disqualified some ballots.

"If they are able to separate the fraud from the wishes of the people, at that time we will see if the election is legitimate," he said. "Anything else is a coup."

Final results are expected by Oct. 31. Few independent observers believe that Qanooni, a member of the ethnic Tajik minority, could command a majority in a country deeply fractured by years of tribal and ethnic warfare.

Karzai enjoys strong support among the country's traditional rulers, the Pashtuns, as well as the international community.

Analysts initially forecast that Qanooni and other candidates linked to the former Northern Alliance, which helped the United States drive out the Taliban, might receive enough votes to force Karzai into a second round.

But several figures — including former President Burhanuddin Rabbani, a Tajik who led Afghanistan during its ruinous 1992-96 civil war, and two brothers of slain Northern Alliance commander Ahmad Shah Massood — have thrown their support behind Karzai.

Qanooni said the maneuvering exposed "who was with the nation and who was out for themselves" and left him well-placed to build a strong opposition party ahead of next year's parliamentary election and the 2009 presidential vote.

"I want to reform and develop this country's political culture," he said. "If cheating wins this election, that will be our strategy for the next five years."