KABUL (PAN): Presidential candidate Dr. Abdullah Abdullah Sunday alleged brazen irregularities in presidential elections and warned they could affect the outcome.

Without giving details, Abdullah said: "The violations are glaring and run into hundreds. The violations I am talking about are extraordinary and will change the result. The people should be informed of these anomalies."

The former foreign minister claimed receiving reports from areas where there was either no polling or the turnout was extremely low. But the number of votes counted in favour of President Karzai was several time higher, he charged.

But Wahid Omar, spokesman for the Karzai campaign, spurned the allegations as groundless. He insisted there had been violations. "If Abdullah's team has proofs of fraud, we don't know about them."

Omar argued the Abdullah team believed residents of restive provinces would not go to the polls but they turned out in large numbers and their ballots could not be ignored.

The former minister demanded ballot boxes received from polling centers where irregularities took place should be quarantined. He suggested massive fraud was committed in Ghazni and Kandahar.

"Gen. Abdul Razzaq, deputy commander of border police, was directly involved in intimidating people and barring monitors from voting sites. He went as far as to open one polling station at his guesthouse in Ghazni province. The ballot boxes should be quarantined."

Abdullah maintained he was in touch with several other candidates, who also confirmed violations in the elections. Some of them had questioned the legitimacy of the polls, he said.

The list of all polling centers should have been handed to candidates, he believed, slamming the Independent Election Commission (IEC) for refusing to give them even complete details of polling centres.

Many people with complaints of rigging were in contact with him, claimed the ex-minister, who added he had asked his supporters to exercise patience and that he would expose the fraud in accordance with the law.

The initial result of the presidential and provincial council polls will be announced two days later on Tuesday, with the final outcome expected in mid-September.

mnm/mud