The main challenger to Afghanistan's incumbent president is expected to announce soon whether he will participate or withdraw from next week's election runoff. Abdullah Abdullah had issued what he called minimum conditions for the runoff following the disputed first-round vote and set Saturday as the deadline for authorities to implement them. The Afghan capital, quoted Abdullah's campaign as saying that it would hold a news conference to discuss the matter on Sunday. "His spokesman [says] that a final decision hasn't yet been made by Dr Abdullah to react to the fact that many of those conditions have not been met," our correspondent said. "We're now told [Abdullah] is in intensive meetings; he is still making up his mind." The first round of voting on August 20 was so badly affected by ballot-box stuffing and distorted tallies that more than one million votes were thrown out. The fraud pushed Hamid Karzai, the president, below the required 50 per cent margin needed to win, forcing the country into a second round to be held on November 7. Abdullah has accused the country's electoral commission of being complicit in the fraud.
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