Hamid Karzai, Afghanistan's president, is facing a runoff vote after a UN-backed election watchdog recommended that thousands of ballots apparently cast in his favour be scrapped, diplomatic sources have told Al Jazeera. The Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) published the findings of its long-awaited investigation into poll fraud in Afganistan's elections on Monday. The report, published on the ECC's website, called for ballots cast at 210 polling stations during the country's August 20 polls to be discarded. Sources told Al Jazeera that the move had pushed Karzai's share of the vote to below 50 per cent, the number needed to avoid a runoff with Abdullah Abdullah, his main rival.
