| Oh we do, we do ... |
| Fraud can be expected in an established democracy, as we all know too well ... |
| Also to be expected in your every day established kleptocracy... |
| Though he's pretty much a puppet ... |
| Hey! Watch what he does when I tug on this! |
Early results were supposed to have been released yesterday but that deadline was pushed back indefinitely.
Mr Karzai's comments did nothing to stop Robert Gibbs, the White House press secretary, raising the issue again, saying that officials must address the fraud allegations. "They've got to address any accusations out there and assure people of the legitimacy of the election," he said.
A US State Department spokesman acknowledged that there were "serious claims of fraud, and we expect them to be investigated". He noted that the electoral process had not yet run its course but added: "It's critically important that at the end of the process there's a government that the Afghan people and the international community can regard as legitimate."
Washington has been slow to respond to the call from Britain, France and Germany for an international conference on Afganistan's future. The State Department spokesman said that "if there's a conference on Afghanistan the US will come" -- though he noted that there was no shortage of existing forums for such discussions, from regular Nato conferences and the UN General Assembly to the forthcoming G20 summit in Pittsburgh.
Washington is unlikely to welcome another conference on the country's security until President Obama has decided whether to authorise a second surge to add to the 21,000 reinforcements already en route to the region. There may be no decision on such a move until November, analysts believe -- and the more doubt is cast on the election results, the tougher it will be to make the case for sending more troops.
Analysts believe that Mr Karzai, who struck pre-election deals with warlords suspected of having committed human rights atrocities or involvement in drug smuggling, would probably have won the vote even without the ballot-stuffing he is accused of. Partial results published at the weekend showed that he had almost reached the 50 per cent threshold needed to avoid a run-off, with almost three quarters of the ballots counted.
A senior Afghan security official told The Times that the biggest threat to security would be the continuation of a corruption-riddled government.