Egypt candidates file appeals, charge vote fraud

Three top candidates in Egypt's presidential race have filed appeals to the election commission, alleging violations in the first round vote that they say could change the outcome.     

The appeals, alleging fraud, were filed ahead of a Sunday deadline. They are likely to enflame an already explosive race, with two of the most polarizing candidates finishing first.     

Preliminary results from last week's election placed Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi and Hosni Mubarak's last prime minister, Ahmed Shafiq, as the two candidates entering a June 16-17 runoff. Thirteen candidates were on the ballot.     

Young, liberal secularists who led the popular rebellion that overthrew longtime leader Hosni Mubarak last year failed to place a candidate in the runoff.     

A large portion of the vote  more than 40 percent  went to candidates who were seen as more in the spirit of the uprising  neither for the Brotherhood nor for the so-called "feloul," or "remnants" of the old autocratic regime. The so-called revolutionary votes were mostly divided among the candidates who placed third and fourth.     

The top finisher, the Brotherhood's Morsi, received only about 25 percent of the vote, according to preliminary results.     

Influential Egyptian-born Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, widely respected throughout the Middle East, urged voters to support Morsi in the runoff.     

AP