Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Sunday called for a manual recount of votes

[FarCenter]

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Sunday called for a manual recount of votes cast in Iraq's tight parliamentary election held on March 7.

The premier made the call after the results reported by the country's central electoral commission on Saturday showed that secular Shiite and former prime minister, Ayad Allawi, was ahead of Maliki's bloc by about 8,000 votes with about 92% of ballot papers in all the country's 18 provinces counted.

In his statement on Sunday, Maliki urged Iraq's election commission to "immediately meet the demands of many political parties to proceed with a manual recount," adding the move would "protect political stability in the country and prevent a return to violence."

Maliki's demand, however, was immediately slammed by Allawi's Iraqiya bloc as a threat against the election commission.

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