KABUL, Oct. 9 (Xinhuanet) -- President Hamid Karzai's 15 challengers in the presidential race have rejected the undergoing polls as illegal saying they would not accept its result.

    "This is not a legitimate election. So many foreigners have voted for karzai and Karzai is using government resources for his benefit," Sattar Sirat told journalists after the candidates' meeting here.

    Sirat, an arch rival to Karzai, further added that the opposition would continue the meeting to chalk out their future plan of action.

    They also briefed Jean Arnault, the special envoy of UN Secretary General and the representative of European Union to Afghanistan Francis Windrel over their observations.

    Opposition candidates who earlier several times threatened to boycott the election have failed to reach an agreement and vie Karzai from a united platform.

    "Keeping on malpractice and forgery in the polls would face backlash and probably lead to violence," Sirat warned without elaboration.

    Earlier in the morning just hour after voting began the opposition alleged that the officials were using washable ink in marking voters' finger instead of the original one brought for the purpose to enable people to vote more than once.

    Another presidential candidate Hafiz Mansoor said that four Pakistanis casting their votes in a polling station here were detained.

    Over 13 million Afghans including some three million refugees in Pakistan and Iran began voting at 7:00 a.m. amid tight securityto elect the country's president through direct balloting.

    The voting concludes at 4:00 p.m. but ballot counting, according to the joint UN-Afghan election commission would take two to three weeks. Enditem