Losing Pakistani Party Charges Election Fraud - East Idaho News
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Losing Pakistani Party Charges Election Fraud

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GETTY 51413 Nawaz%20Sharif%20?  SQUARESPACE CACHEVERSION=1368520531827ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP/Getty Images(ISLAMABAD) — Newly-elected Pakistani leader Nawaz Sharif can’t even savor his party’s victory in last Saturday’s historic election without a controversy already popping up.

Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party grabbed 124 seats, allowing him to govern without a coalition.

However, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party, led by cricket legend Imran Khan, is claiming that the election was rigged.  Khan’s party had expected to win the election or, at the very least, perform much better than the 32 seats it collected.

As a result, there were huge demonstrations Monday by Khan supporters in Karachi and Lahore, demanding a recount of votes.

That’s probably not going to happen as the European Union election observer mission has pretty much determined that everything was on the up-and-up despite violence by the Taliban to disrupt his election.

For his part, the former and now future prime minister Sharif says that Khan should display the sportsmanship he exhibited during his athletic career and take his loss without sour grapes.

Copyright 2013 ABC News Radio

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