By Mirwais Harooni
KABUL, Aug 16 (Reuters) - About 3,000 protesters gathered outside Afghanistan's parliament on Tuesday to demand that President Hamid Karzai stop trying to alter the results of last year's parliamentary election.
Wrangling over the outcome of the fraud-tainted election has dragged on ever since the September vote, when opponents of Karzai made major gains. The 249-seat assembly still barely functions and the cabinet remains incomplete.
Among the protesters was Hamidzai Lalai, a lawmaker from the southern province of Kandahar, the birthplace of the Taliban. He said sit-ins would be staged from Thursday to keep up pressure on Karzai and the Independent Election Commission (IEC).
"We have our supporters ready in different provinces and we have already brought 1,000 tents to stay here," Lalai told Reuters outside parliament in Kabul.
"If the government brings in any changes in parliament we will ask 4,000 of our supporters each day to stage a sit-in in front of the presidential palace," he said.
In June, a special tribunal set up by decree by Karzai threw out results for about a quarter of the assembly seats. After a recount of ballots, it ordered that lawmakers in 62 seats vacate their places because of alleged voting irregularities.
The IEC, which ran the foreign-funded poll, at first strongly opposed the ruling but changed course last month, saying it would review it and compare it with its own findings. The IEC could not be reached for comment on Tuesday.
Most lawmakers, including many who do not face being unseated, reject the tribunal as unconstitutional and illegal.
Many Afghan officials and international observers agree, and critics say the court was set up to further Karzai's political agenda and silence opposition.
Karzai, re-elected after a 2009 presidential poll that was also marred by fraud, has often been accused of treating parliament as a rubber stamp.
The deepening political crisis comes at a worrying time for Afghanistan, where violence is at record levels.
The NATO-led coalition last month began a gradual process of handing security responsibility to Afghans, and the United States began to withdraw some troops. The last foreign combat troops are due to leave Afghanistan by the end of 2014. (Additional reporting by Abdul Aziz Ebrahimi; Writing by Paul Tait; Editing by Alistair Lyon)
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