President Hamid Karzai’s rival in the second round of the Afghan presidential election has announced in Kabul that he is withdrawing from the poll.“I will not participate in the election,” Dr Abdullah told supporters, saying his demands for ensuring a fraud-free election had not been met.
But he stopped short of calling for a boycott of next Saturday’s vote.
Mr Karzai rejected his demand that election officials who presided over the first round should be dismissed.
Earlier, the US said a pull-out would not invalidate the vote’s legitimacy.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told reporters in the United Arab Emirates: “We see that happen in our own country where, for whatever combination of reasons, one of the candidates decides not to go forward.”
KARZAI V ABDULLAH
Hamid Karzai:
- First popularly elected president of Afghanistan
- Opposed Soviet occupation in 1980s
- Critics say he has done little to rein in corruption
Abdullah Abdullah:
- Tajik-Pashtun, doctor by profession
- Senior Northern Alliance leader during Taliban rule
- Removed from Karzai’s cabinet in 2006
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But the BBC’s Andrew North, in Kabul, says Abdullah Abdullah’s withdrawal means this is uncharted territory, and it is unclear what will happen next.
Asked by reporters if he was calling for his supporters to boycott the vote planned for next Saturday, Dr Abdullah said: “I have not made that call”.
There has been much speculation that there could be some kind of deal which would possibly see the emergence of a national unity government in the wake of Dr Abdullah’s withdrawal, our correspondent says.
But reports quoting a senior member of the Karzai campaign team suggested it planned to go ahead with this week’s presidential run-off.
“As far as we are concerned, we will go for the run-off,” Moin Marastyal was quoted by Reuters as saying.
But, our correspondent adds, we know from many in the international community that there is great reluctance to see that happen.
Below threshold
Hundreds of thousands of votes were discounted from August’s first round of voting, which was marred by widespread allegations of fraud.
An investigation by the UN-backed Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC) led to Mr Karzai’s share of the vote dropping to 49.67% - below the crucial 50% plus one vote threshold needed to avoid a second round.
Dr Abdullah was adjudged in the end to have won about 31% of valid votes cast.
Emotion was clearly visible in Dr Abdullah’s face as he announced his decision to pull out of the race to be Afghan leader on Sunday, our correspondent says.
The decision was given to his supporters at a meeting in a big tent in Kabul, where Afghanistan’s first post-Taliban government was agreed eight years ago.
Dr Abdullah - a Tajik-Pashtun former eye surgeon - served as foreign minister in the short-lived government headed by the Northern Alliance, and continued as “foreign minister in exile” throughout the years of Taliban rule, which ended in 2001.
He continued in the role in the government that was formed by President Karzai after the fall of the Taliban in 2001, leaving it five years later.