Just before the recount started, election commission spokesman Qassim al-Abboudi said that the other outstanding request for a recount by the main Kurdish bloc had been withdrawn.

"Yesterday, the Kurdish alliance informed us officially of the withdrawal of their request for a recount in the provinces of Ninevah and Tamim to safeguard the national interest," he said.

Even if the recount does not swing the results in his direction, al-Maliki may still benefit from the actions of a Shiite-led commission responsible for vetting candidates for links to Saddam's regime. The commission has recommended disqualifying several of Allawi's candidates and throwing out their votes.

Al-Abboudi said the elections panel is still waiting for an appeals court's decision whether to exclude as many as nine candidates who won the election but are accused of having ties to Saddam Hussein's outlawed Baath Party.

The court has already dismissed 52 candidates, including one winner, in a Shiite-led post-election purge that Sunnis believe specifically targeted their supporters.

"If these winners are excluded, then this will affect the results of the election," al-Abboudi said.

Allawi and his supporters have warned of an effort to steal the election and last week the former prime minister called for an internationally supervised caretaker government to oversee the process of determining the election results and forming a new government.

That call was promptly rejected by al-Maliki, who says he is simply trying to make sure the election process is above suspicion.

The United Nations, the US Embassy, and the Arab League as well as Iraqi election officials have all declared the election free of systematic fraud.