KABUL (AFP) – A candidate for the Afghan presidential election in an interview with AFP Saturday accused incumbent Hamid Karzai of having tried to to buy him off.

Abdullah Abdullah said Karzai had offered him a prestigious post in the next government if he was prepared to withdraw from the August 20 election.

"I met Karzai (on Thursday). He wanted to know if I was determined to continue or if there was some... flexibility," Abdullah told AFP. "And I absolutely want to continue," he added.

"He asked me what I thought of the job of secretary general of the government," said Abdullah, referring to a Western proposal for the creation of a powerful post aimed at improving the running of Afghanistan's government.

"I said it would be for the elected government of Afghanistan to choose someone. Now he knows I am not for sale," said Abdullah, the candidate for the opposition National Front.

Abdullah's allegation came after the leaders of the Uzbek and Hazara minorities, who between them garnered more than 21 percent of the popular vote in the 2004 election, announced they were backing Karzai.

The August 20 poll will be only the second presidential election in Afghanistan's history. It was originally scheduled to take place in April, but was pushed back because of security concerns in the war-torn country.

The fundamentalist Taliban were in power here between 1996 and 2001, and are now waging a deadly insurgency aimed at toppling Karzai's US-backed government and ousting around 70,000 foreign troops.

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