KABUL - Afghan electoral authorities said Sunday they still did not know when preliminary results from last month's presidential election would be made available, three days after the scheduled release date.

The Independent Electoral Commission has been trickling out the results since the vote on August 20 and said on Saturday it hoped to be able to release preliminary results from all polling stations on Sunday or Monday.

But on Sunday spokeswoman Marzia Seddiqi said the commission would only be releasing another batch of partial results later in the day and had no timetable for the first preliminary results.

Asked when the preliminary results would be released, she said simply: "I have no idea."

Even once the preliminary figures are released, full results will have to wait until hundreds of allegations of voting irregularities are investigated.

The final results are not expected before September 17.

The commission on Saturday cancelled the release of the latest tranche of results blaming technical problems.

Throughout the labourious process of piecemeal announcements, the two main contenders for the presidency, incumbent Hamid Karzai and Abdullah Abdullah, have each claimed victory.

Abdullah, formerly foreign minister, has also alleged widespread vote-rigging by Karzai's camp and has threatened to reject any result he regards as compromised.

The latest results were released September 3, and showed Karzai maintaining a lead with 47.3 percent of the results from 60 percent of the polling stations used in Afghanistan's second-only direct presidential election.

Out of 3.69 million valid votes, Karzai won 1.74 million and Abdullah 1.2 million or 32.6 percent, the commission announced.

The winner needs to secure an outright majority of 50 percent plus one vote in order to avoid a run-off, which many observers have warned could be damaging if turnout proves even lower a second time around.

NATO and Western allies have stressed in recent days their long-term commitment to keeping troops in Afghanistan to fight a resurgent Taliban, despite concerns about fraud and low turnout in the elections.