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Ashraf Ghani has been sworn is as the new president of Afghanistan in a lavish ceremony at the presidential palace in Kabul, ending months of turmoil over a fraud tainted election.

The former finance minister was inaugurated in a grand event on Monday marking the country's first democratic transfer of power since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

"I am not better than anyone from among you. If I do any good, give me your support. If I go wrong, set me right,'' Ghani said.

 vKABUL, Afghanistan — Afghanistan’s election commission on Sunday pronounced Ashraf Ghani the winner of the country’s presidential election, but it withheld an announcement of the total votes won, despite an exhaustive and costly audit process overseen by the United Nations and financed by the American government.

KABUL (Pajhwok): Presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah on Monday reiterated his stance, saying he rejected the result of the mid-June runoff.

He renewed his commitment to defending people’s votes and the election of new leadership based on genuine ballots. But Abdullah said he would not accept a government elected through fraud.

Addressing a gathering of supporters in Kabul, he said the international community had evinced its interest in facilitating a solution to the election crisis.

The Independent Election Commission's (IEC) spokesman, Noor Mohammad Noor said that the 100 percent audit of vote's process has been completed after 48 days on Thursday night, which was set to build confidence between the two candidates so that issues do not arise in the future.

Noor said that the majority of fraud took place by "the government, government officials and supporters of both candidates and not by the IEC employees." Currently, the IEC is working on entering the checklists into the database.

The two candidates in Afghanistan's disputed presidential election have reached a political agreement that would outline the terms of a power-sharing deal, both camps said on Friday.

"We are putting the past behind us. We are looking into the future," said Ghani Ashraf, one of the candidates.

Attempts to resume the audit of Afghanistan's presidential election have stalled as candidate Abdullah Abdullah disagreed over the criteria to address alleged fraud in the June run-off election.

Abdullah and rival Ashraf Ghani agreed to the inspection of all 8.1 million ballots cast in the June 14 poll in a deal brokered by US Secretary of State John Kerry. However, the recount has since faced several suspensions as the candidates sparred over how to disqualify ballots.

The United Nations (UN) reported that both presidential candidates signaled their support on Saturday for the UN's proposed invalidation criteria for the vote auditing process.

The UN office in Kabul said that the organization was notified by both candidates and now expects the audit process to move forward without further delay. The UN had previously submitted the proposal to the Independent Election Commission (IEC) without approval from the candidates and the commission said the auditing process would need to be put on hold until they could reach agreement.

KABUL (Pajhwok): The Independent Election Commission (IEC) announced on Wednesday that the recount of votes cast in the June 14 runoff would begin tomorrow (Thursday) in the presence of national and international observers.

KABUL (Pajhwok): At a meeting convened by President Hamid Karzai the other day, the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) presented its proposal for an additional audit aimed at strengthening the credibility of the country’s electoral process and acceptance of the results from the recent presidential election run-off by both campaigns and Afghans.