Hundreds protest alleged Afghan election fraud

- In the southern Helmand province, Taliban fighters attacked several checkpoints, killing three police and wounding two, said Omer Zwak, a spokesman for the governor. He said 10 militants were killed.

Associated Press

Taliban spokesman Qari Yousef Ahmadi confirmed the attack, saying the militants had captured half of the Sangin district.

In the southern Uruzgan province, a remotely detonated bomb killed three people and gunmen on a motorbike killed one police officer in the southern Kandahar province, authorities said. In the western Herat province, a roadside bomb killed one civilian and wounded another, provincial police spokesman Raouf Ahmadi said.

At night, gunmen attacked a NATO air base on the outskirts of the eastern city of Jalalabad where the U.S. has forces stationed, provincial government spokesman Ahmad Zia Abdulzai said.

Afghan army units told him that a first attack targeted the base entrance, while sporadic gunfire rang out for around a half an hour as helicopters flew overhead, he added, saying he had no information regarding the number of forces involved.

NATO said in an emailed statement that two rockets impacted a base but resulted in no damage to equipment or buildings and no fatalities. The base was later secured, it added.

Hundreds of Afghans protested Saturday against alleged fraud in last week’s presidential runoff, part of escalating tensions over what Western officials had hoped would be a smooth transfer of power.

Former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, who is running against Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, a former finance minister, has accused electoral officials and others of trying to rig the June 14 vote against him.

Abdullah announced this week that he was severing ties with the Independent Election Commission and would refuse to recognize any results it releases. He also suggested that the United Nations step in, an idea supported by President Hamid Karzai, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term.

The IEC’s official timetable says initial results are due July 2. Independent Election Commission chairman Ahmad Yousuf Nouristani said Saturday that the commission would address or investigate any concern Abdullah had.

Around a thousand Abdullah supporters gathered in Kabul to protest against the electoral commission, accusing it of fraud and chanting: “Our vote is our blood and we will stand up for it!”

Hundreds of anti-riot police surrounded the demonstration, which was peaceful.

“We gather today to protest against the election commission, which is not an independent commission at all. They are conducting fraud for a specific candidate,” said Mohammed Ghani Sharifi, a 23-year-old protester. “The people are so upset and they cannot tolerate such fraud because the people took risks to cast their votes.”

While the vote was relatively peaceful, the Taliban had warned people not to participate and carried out a handful of attacks in different parts of the country.

The U.N. representative to Afghanistan, Nicholas Haysom, told a news conference that people had a “democratic right” to protest while urging them to remain peaceful and “refrain from inflammatory statements.”

“We are talking to the candidates even as we speak, and to their teams,” Haysom said. “And at least part of the message that we have for them — and have had really since the outset — is that there will be a winner and there will be a loser and what we expect of the candidates is to exhibit statesmanship, not gamesmanship.

He added that the U.N. would also look at ways of bringing “extra scrutiny” to the ballots.

Afghanistan’s next president is expected to sign a long-delayed security pact to allow nearly 10,000 American troops to remain in the country after most foreign forces withdraw by the end of the year. Both candidates have promised to sign the pact, but the next president must be sworn in first.