DHAKA: The Afghan government on Sunday rejected a proposal to ban Facebook during an ongoing deadlock over the presidential election, despite fears that social media postings have fanned ethnic hatred.

The dispute between candidates Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah over alleged fraud in the June 14 election has triggered bitter Internet exchanges between rival supporters that threaten to spill into violence.

Ghani attracts much of his support from the Pashtun tribes of the south and east, while Abdullah’s loyalists are Tajiks and other northern Afghan groups, echoing the ethnic divisions of the bloody 1992-1996 civil war.

‘The national security council discussed banning of Facebook in their meeting today,’ Fayeq Wahedi, deputy presidential spokesman, told media, reports The Straits Times.

BDST: 1718 HRS, JULY 05, 2014