Hillary frees delegates

Denver - Hillary Clinton on Wednesday called on her delegates to support Barack Obama, just hours before the Democratic Party's delegates were to make a formal and symbolic choice between two historic firsts - an African-American or woman presidential candidate on Wednesday.

"I am here to release you as my delegates," Clinton said in a final meeting with her about 1 800 delegates, sparking boos and cries of "no" from the crowd of still-bitter supporters.

The former first lady said she recognised that many in the room had hoped to vote their conscience, picking Clinton in the same way their state constituencies had in the intra-party primaries, one of the closest in modern history.

Obama, 47, has already secured the centre-left party's nomination after the long primary election season, but some supporters of his narrowly defeated rival were holding out against Clinton's emotional appeal on Tuesday evening for them to swing their votes to Obama in the interest of party unity.

The practice in which delegates from each state vote to formally name the party's candidate has become largely ceremonial, and candidates that lost the primary elections have freed their delegates to support the prospective nominee.

The move to even read Clinton's name during the vote at all aims to defuse tension from a historic series of state-by-state primaries pitting Clinton and Obama against each other.

- DPA