Abdullah leads in Afghan presidential election

On April, 5 more than 7 million Afghans out of 12 million eligible voters cast their votes to elect a successor to the outgoing President Hamid Karzai for the next five years in the first transfer of power through polling in the country's history, Xinhua reported.

Up to 36 percent of the voters were women.

The number of presidential candidates has dropped to eight after the withdrawal of three contenders from the race, and over 2,500 candidates ran for 458 provincial councils seats in 34 provinces, including 96 seats for women.