Taiwan court challenge delayed

Opposition supporters have kept up their protests

A Taiwan court has temporarily blocked an opposition bid to have Saturday's presidential election ruled invalid.

The court said President Chen Shui-bian's victory had not yet been officially confirmed, so could not yet be contested.

The court said the challenge could be re-filed once election authorities confirm the result, probably on Friday.

The move came as politicians tried to reach a deal to allow a recount in the disputed presidential poll.

Legislators said parliament could meet on Friday to agree a change in the law, to permit recounts in very close races.

But the opposition Kuomintang (KMT) later appeared to scupper the plan when it said it would not agree to the compromise.

President Chen was re-elected by a margin of only 0.2% of the vote, hours after being shot, and his opponent Lien Chan has demanded that ballots be recounted and the poll be declared unfair.

POLL RESULTS Chen Shui-bian: 6,471,970 (50.11%) Lien Chan: 6,442,452 (49.89%) 337,297 invalid ballots Turnout: 80.28% Source: Central Election Commission Q&A: Election 'conspiracy' Taiwan split after vote

The opposition raised suspicions over the shooting, and said the election was marred by voting irregularities.

But President Chen says the assassination attempt was genuine and rejected allegations of vote-rigging.

At a meeting on Wednesday to try to end the deadlock, both sides initially said they had reached agreement for a meeting of parliament to back the change to the law.

But KMT legislators later backed away from the agreement. Some KMT members want Mr Chen to solve the crisis by issuing a decree ordering the votes be recounted, since the KMT claims the recount would be quicker.

But Mr Chen wanted a change of law to be voted through parliament, before a recount could go ahead.