NEW YORK - Afghan officials have set aside ballots from nearly 450 polling places pending a fraud investigation, The Los Angeles Times reported Monday amid mounting allegations of irregularities in the recent presidential election. The officials declined to say how many votes would be affected, but since voting occurred in 26,000 venues, the impact of the set aside may be minimal, the newspaper said a dispatch from Kabul. However, the set aside could signal more disqualifications down the line as more votes are counted, the Times said. The announcement came as Afghan President Hamid Karzai moved closer to the majority he needs under law for a first-round victory in the Aug. 20 vote. The Times said supporters of Karzais main rival, Abdullah Abdullah, could react violently if he does not get the chance to face the incumbent in a runoff. Opposition supporters have claimed massive fraud in the election. A U.N.-backed complaints commission has received more than 2,000 fraud claims, with nearly 700 serious enough to affect the results, the Times said. The commission said Sunday that Karzai had more than 48 percent with Abdullah nearly 32 percent, with nearly three-quarters of the vote counted. Meanwhile, The New York Times reported that loyalists established phantom polling sites to generate votes for President Karzais re-elected. No one voted at the sites, numbering about 800, as they existed only on paper, but Western and Afghan officials told the Times hundreds of thousands of ballots were recorded at the sites. A Western diplomat in Afghanistan told The New York Times as many as 800 fake sites may have been created for the Aug. 20 elections. Local workers, whose claims were confirmed by another Western official, told the newspaper hundreds, and in some cases thousands, of votes for Karzai came from each of those fake sites. We think that about 15 percent of the polling sites never opened on Election Day, the Western diplomat said. But they still managed to report thousands of ballots for Karzai. Officials said Karzai supporters also took over about 800 legitimate polling cites to report fraudulent votes. They told Te New York Times Karzai ballots may exceed the actual number of votes cast by a factor of 10 in some provinces. This was fraud en masse, the Western diplomat was quoted as saying. A spokesman for Karzais campaign told The New York Times there had been cases of fraud by candidates, but accused Karzais opponents of trying to score political points with accusations in the media. Citing local workers, The New York Times reported that hundreds, and in some cases thousands, of votes for Karzai in the election last month came from each of the fake places. That pattern was confirmed by another Western official based in Afghanistan. We think that about 15 percent of the polling sites never opened on Election Day, the unnamed senior Western diplomat said. But they still managed to report thousands of ballots for Karzai. The widening accounts of fraud pose a stark problem for the Obama administration, which has 68,000 American troops deployed here to help reverse gains by Taliban insurgents, The New York Times said in a dispatch from Kabul. American officials hoped that the election would help turn Afghans away from the Taliban by giving them a greater voice in government. Instead, the Obama administration now faces the prospect of having to defend an Afghan administration for the next five years that is widely seen as illegitimate, NYT said. So far, the Independent Election Commission has released results from seven of Panjwai Districts in the Pushtun-dominated region polling centers. The tally so far: 5,213 votes for Karzai, 328 for his main rival Abdullah Abdullah.