KABUL — Hundreds of Afghans protested Saturday against alleged fraud in last week’s presidential runoff, part of escalating tensions over what Western officials had hoped would be a smooth transfer of power as violence across the country killed at least 13 people.
Former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, who is running against Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai, a former finance minister, has accused electoral officials and others of trying to rig the June 14 vote against him.
Abdullah announced last week that he was severing ties with the Independent Election Commission and would refuse to recognize any results it releases.
He also suggested that the United Nations step in, an idea supported by President Hamid Karzai, who is constitutionally barred from seeking a third term.
The IEC’s official timetable says initial results are due July 2. Independent Election Commission chairman Ahmad Yousuf Nouristani said Saturday that the commission would address or investigate any concern Abdullah had.
About a thousand Abdullah supporters gathered in Kabul to protest against the electoral commission, accusing it of fraud and chanting: “Our vote is our blood, and we will stand up for it!”
Hundreds of anti-riot police surrounded the peaceful demonstration.
While the vote was relatively peaceful, the Taliban had warned people not to participate and carried out a handful of attacks in parts of the country.
In a separate demonstration, hundreds of Abdullah supporters marched from the northern part of the capital toward the airport, where they were stopped by a police roadblock that prevented anyone from entering or leaving Kabul’s international airport.
The U.N. representative to Afghanistan, Nicholas Haysom, said at a news conference that people had a “democratic right” to protest, while urging them to remain peaceful and “refrain from inflammatory statements.”
Afghanistan’s next president is expected to sign a long-delayed security pact to allow nearly 10,000 American service members to remain in the country after most foreign forces withdraw by the end of the year. Both candidates have promised to sign the pact, but the next president must be sworn in first.
Earlier on Saturday, a suicide car bombing in Kabul aimed at a senior government official killed one civilian and wounded three others but did not harm its apparent target, Afghan security officials said.
Kabul police spokesman Hashmat Stanikzai said the bomber detonated his explosives-laden vehicle alongside the armored car of Mohammed Masoom Stanikzai, a senior official in the High Peace Council, a government body tasked with peace talks with the Taliban insurgency. The two men are not related.
A police officer at the scene said Stanikzai, who also serves as an adviser to Karzai, was not harmed.
