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Top Afghan election official quits over fraud claims | |
(35 minutes later) | |
A senior Afghan election official at the centre of fraud claims in the presidential run-off vote has resigned. | |
Zia ul-Haq Amarkhail said he was stepping down "for the sake of national unity", denying allegations of ballot box-stuffing earlier this month. | |
His resignation comes after audio tapes were released allegedly revealing that Mr Amarkhail was trying to influence the outcome of the vote. | |
They were published by the camp of one of the candidates - Abdullah Abdullah. | |
However, his rival Ashraf Ghani has also made allegations of fraud. | |
The official results of the 14 June run-off are yet to be published. | |
'Stuffed sheep' | |
In a dramatic turn of events on Monday, Mr Amarkhail tendered his resignation on national television. | |
He vehemently denied any wrongdoing, saying he had been the victim of a "plot". | |
He also described the tapes as "fake" and blamed the country's security services for interfering in the election. | |
In an apparent reference to ballot box stuffing, the tapes appear to show Mr Amarkhail urging a colleague to "bring the sheep stuffed and not empty". | |
The reference to sheep and goats - ballot boxes and people or votes - is made several times during the recorded exchanges. | |
Reacting to the latest developments, Mr Abdullah said the resignation of Mr Amarkhail had opened the door for discussions with Afghanistan's Independent Election Commission. | |
Mr Abdullah also said his recent decision to stop co-operating with the election authorities had not been intended to disrupt the process, but to prevent a fraudulent election result and to protect people's votes. | |
The resignation could be a first step towards ending the deadlock which threatened to plunge the country into chaos, the BBC's Karen Allen in Kabul reports. |