KABUL, July 7 (Reuters) – Afghanistan declared former World Bank official Ashraf Ghani the winner of last month's presidential election run-off on Monday on preliminary results that threaten to split the country along ethnic lines.
The Independent Election Commission said Ghani won the June 14 second round with 56.44 percent of the vote, according to preliminary results. The tally might still change, however, when the final official numbers come out on July 22.
Phi Beta Iota: As Robert Steele, Robert Young Pelton, and Andrew Garfield have stated all along, this outcome was certain. The only thing that was not certain was the degree to which fraud by Karzai on behalf of Abdullah, funded by a mix of rogue US elements as well as Iran, might make the outcome closer than it should be. Below for the record are all of the headlines we posted prior to this announcement — headlines in stark contradiction to the US party line that Abdullah was the annointed and certain winner.
