Prime Minister Harper addresses Canadian troops in Afghanistan

Just a week after refusing to entertain the idea of a runoff election, it appears sufficient pressure has been applied to Afghanistan’s President Hamid Karzai from his international patrons, that he has been forced to accept what many have considered inevitable for the past two months; a second round of voting for the dubious honor of presiding over the beleaguered nation.

The initial results of the original election on September 20, 2009 immediately showed troubling signs of massive voter fraud throughout the country. A two month investigation by a United Nations backed panel, the Electoral Complaints Commission (ECC), validated many of the hundreds of officially lodged complaints of widespread vote rigging. According to their statement, the ECC found “clear and convincing evidence of fraud relating to improperly recorded vote totals for candidates,” and ordered ballots from 210 polling stations invalidated.
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