Million Karzai votes deemed invalid

BBC:

A panel probing fraud claims in the Afghan election has found Hamid Karzai did not gain enough valid votes for an outright win, the BBC understands.

Preliminary results from August's first round had placed Mr Karzai comfortably over the 50% plus one vote threshold needed to avoid a run-off.

But one poll monitoring group estimates that almost one million of Mr Karzai's votes have now been deemed invalid.

Poll rules say Mr Karzai must now face a run-off against his nearest rival.

In Washington, the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she expected Mr Karzai to announce on Tuesday how he would "set the stage" to resolve the country's political crisis.

"I am very hopeful that we will see a resolution in line with the constitutional order in the next several days," Mrs Clinton said.

...

Karzai has to find it ironic that a bunch of Chicago politicians are telling him to ignore bogus votes. However, if he is to get legitimacy, he will probably need to have a runoff right away.

It is my own belief that the Chicago politicians are just using this as an excuse for putting off a decision on the troop increases the anti war left does not want.