Dispute over Jalisco election results continues

Sunday's elections to appoint a new governor in the western Mexican state of Jalisco are heading for a very close result, as disputes grow over the electoral process.

With seventy-five percent of the votes counted, the National Action Party, or PAN's candidate, Francisco Ramirez, is ahead of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, the PRI's Jorge Arana, by just over two percent of the votes.

The Jalisco state electoral council decided on Monday to suspend counting after errors were found but said on Tuesday that an automatic recount would not be authorised.

Election officials said they would be announcing the winner on Sunday.

On Wednesday PRI supporters - questioning the impartality of the body and accusing the PAN of fraud and vote rigging - stormed the council's offices. Party leaders in the capital, Mexico City, threatened to boycott the inauguration ceremony of the new president, the PAN's Vicente Fox, on the first of December unless a full manual recount goes ahead.

The PAN won presidential elections in July, putting an end to more than seven decades of PRI rule.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service