Karzai agreed to take part in a second and decisive round of voting after talks with US officials [AFP]

Friday's threat came as a 12-day campaign for a fresh round of voting scheduled for November 7 kicked off on Saturday in the country.

"The Islamic emirate (of Afghanistan) once again informs all the people that no one should participate in this American process and should boycott the process," said a Taliban statement emailed to the AFP news agency on Friday.

"The mujahidin are fully prepared to defeat this process. Anyone who participates and gets hurt will be responsible for their own losses."

Afghanistan's presidential election on August 20 was marred by rigging and hit by a violent Taliban campaign that has been blamed for keeping turnout below 40 per cent.

The Taliban threatened to behead any voter who dared to visit polling booths, although there were no reported beheadings during or after the election.

Afghans will be voting again after Hamid Karzai, the Afghan president, agreed earlier this week to a second round runoff against Abdullah Abdullah, his main rival, following fraud investigations by the UN.

'Mullah Omar's orders'

The Taliban threat came a day after the US special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan said he believed  the runoff would run more smoothly than the first round.

"It is reasonable to hope that there will be [fewer] irregularities this time, for several reasons," Richard Holbrooke said.

"One - there are only two candidates; two - there is the experience factor," he said, referring to the Afghan people's prior experience of casting votes in August.

"Three - the international community, including the forces under General [Stanley] McChrystal's command are going to go all out to help make this a success. Now, [those forces] did so on August 20, but there are more forces in the country today."

'Correct' relationship

Karzai remains besieged, with speculation growing that his relationship with Holbrooke has deteriorated since the August poll.

But Holbrooke insisted he had respect for Karzai and that he was ready to work with him if the Afghan president is re-elected.

"They [relations with Karzai] are correct. They are appropriate," Holbrooke said.

"I speak to him on behalf of my government and he speaks as president of the country. I respect him and, if he is re-elected as president on November 7, we all look forward to working closely with him."

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