Italy's foreign ministry on Monday welcomed the preliminary results of Afghanistan's September presidential polls, calling them as "an important step" while urging "responsible and correct" behaviour by Afghan politicians of all stripes.
"Italy takes note of the publication of the Afghan presidential elections preliminary results, an important step towards completing the electoral process started in late September," said the foreign ministry statement.
"While waiting for the required verifications to be completed, with a view to announcing the final results, we reiterate the expectation of a responsible and correct behaviour by all candidates and parties.
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani appears set to win a second term, after preliminary election results announced on Sunday showed he was on course to win a narrow majority.
Ghani took 50.64% of the vote in the 28 September election, officials said. The initial results were delayed amid protests and allegations of fraud.
Ghani's main rival, Abdullah Abdullah, won 39.52% of the vote, according to officials.
Abdullah disputes about 300,000 votes.
An announcement of the final result could take weeks.
Amid widespread fears of threatened Taliban attacks at polling stations and a perceived lack of voter enthusiasm - both Ghani and Abdullah have been accused of graft while in office - turnout was also the lowest since the Taliban were ousted in 2001.
Just 1.82 million ballots were counted and nearly one million votes were reportedly excluded due to irregularities.
There were 9.6 million registered voters in the election.
The UN, which supported the election process, hailed the preliminary results and urged the election commission to deal "transparently and thoroughly" with any complaints.
