KABUL, Oct 23: Hamid Karzai maintained his clear majority in the Afghan presidential elections as the vote count passed 75 per cent on Saturday, according to the official poll website.

At 11:50am, the US-backed Pashtun leader had won 3,426,845 votes, or 54.5 per cent, of the 77.5 per cent of total ballots counted.

His nearest rival, former education minister and ethnic Tajik Yunus Qanooni, had 17.3 per cent, with Uzbek warlord Abdul Rashid Dostam in third place on 10.9 per cent.

Hazara warlord Mohammad Mohaqiq was in fourth place with 10.5 per cent, followed by French-speaking Tajik Abdul Latif Pedram with 1.3 per cent.

The only female candidate, Masooda Jalal, was in sixth place with 70,695 votes, or 1.1 per cent.

Mr Karzai needs at least 50 per cent of the estimated eight million votes to be elected to the position he has held since shortly after the fall of the Taliban regime in late 2001.

A clear mathematical lead is expected within days.

The October 9 elections, which had been threatened by insurgents, were carried out without feared widespread violence. But allegations of voting irregularities marred the polls with all 18 presidential candidates making formal complaints.

Three foreign independent experts are assessing these complaints and no results will be final until their report is issued.-AFP