Election officials in Afghanistan say ballots from nearly 300 polling stations - about 1 percent of the nationwide total - are being excluded from the count of last month's legislative elections because of fraud.
The head of the joint U.N.-Afghan election commission, Peter Erben, said there was "no sign of systemic countrywide fraud," although there were what he called serious cases of fraud in some areas.
He declared provisional winners from national and provincial assembly seats in two of Afghanistan's 34 provinces Thursday, and said other results will be announced in the coming weeks.
Mr. Erben said final, certified results from the September 18 vote could be expected by the end of this month, after resolving all complaints.
Some information for this report provided by AFP, AP and Reuters.
