Afghan election body fires nine MPs

Afghanistan's election commission on Sunday threw nine MPs out of parliament in a long-running row over fraud-tainted elections last year. After months of protests far fewer election results have been declared fraudulent than an earlier committee recommended.

Reuters/Omar Sobhani

Nine candidates whose victories were earlier disallowed have been reinstated, according to Independent Election Commission (IEC) chairman Fazil Ahmad Manawi.

The IEC said the replacement lawmakers initially won the seats according to preliminary results in last September's parliamentary elections, but were later stripped of their victories.

"The reasons for their removal were not enough [...] so the IEC decided to reinstate those nine persons," Manawi said.

The Afghan parliament has been virtually paralysed since being sworn in last January because of widespread charges of fraud, demonstrations in Kabul by affected politicians and their supporters.

President Hamid Karzai ordered the IEC to resolve the row this month, scrapping another body he had himself created after it said that 62 MPs should be replaced.