UNAMA spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva told a press briefing in the capital Kabul that 73 per cent of the Afghan refugees in Pakistan who registered are men and 27 per cent are women.

The voters registered over four days earlier this week in 620 locations in Pakistan's North West Frontier Province, Baluchistan and the capital Islamabad. The process was run by the International Organization for Migration (IOM).

More than 10 million people - including at least four million women - inside Afghanistan have already registered to vote in the first open presidential election in the country's history. UNAMA estimates that between 600,000 and 800,000 Afghan refugees living in Iran are also eligible to cast their ballot.

The Joint Electoral Management Body (JEMB), a joint UN-Afghan organization, announced that public campaigning by the presidential candidates ended this morning to allow voters a chance to consider the choices. Any form of campaigning, including public gatherings, media appearances and the distribution of printed materials, is banned.

Mr. de Almeida e Silva said electoral preparations are on schedule, with officials recruited to staff the roughly 25,000 polling stations across Afghanistan. Polling materials have been distributed and 500 election observers are in place to monitor Saturday poll.

Nearly 5000 independent domestic observers, as well as about 70,000 members of political parties, are also expected to monitor the polling sites.