President Hamid Karzai held a lead over his main rival Abdullah Abdullah in partial Afghan election returns released today, but still fell short of the outright majority needed to avoid a run-off.
With results from nearly half of polling stations counted in the August 20th election, Mr Karzai held 45.9 per cent of the vote, against 33.3 per cent for Mr Abdullah.
Mr Karzai has already claimed victory, while his rival has alleged widespread fraud.
If no candidate wins more than 50 per cent of the vote, a run-off will be held in early October.
Mr Abdullah has said he will not take part in a power-sharing deal with Mr Karzai if it means accepting what he views as a fraudulent election.
Mr Abdullah's campaign has filed more than 200 reports of voting fraud with the United Nations-backed Electoral Complaints Commission.
He said he "will not accept the outcome" if Mr Karzai is declared the victor, unless the Independent Election Commission resolves hundreds of complaints of voter fraud.
He claimed local and provincial government and electoral officials helped conduct a "state-engineered fraud," stuffing ballot boxes for Mr Karzai and discarding voting papers marked for other candidates.
Complaints of fraud combined with a lower turnout than in the first presidential poll in 2004 may undermine the legitimacy of the result.