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| Afghanistan/South Asia |
| Karzai pledges checks on Afghan warlords |
| 2004-11-05 |
| Hamid Karzai formally accepted his election as president of Afghanistan Thursday, a day after a joint U.N.-Afghan electoral board proclaimed him the victor in the October 9 vote, and said he would not condone the existence of "private militia forces" in the country. Karzai, who has been Afghanistan's interim president leading up to the popular vote, also said he would keep warlords who deal in Afghanistan's lucrative opium trade out of the government. "There will not be any private militia forces in Afghanistan, that is the first demand of the Afghan people," Karzai said. "There will definitely, definitely not be any drug money in (the government). We are going be dedicated, strong in working against that." Wednesday's announcement of Karzai's victory came after a probe into allegations of vote fraud. Even though officials found some problems in the polling that need to be addressed, they said the problems didn't affect the results of the voting. A total of 8,128,940 votes were cast, representing 70 percent of registered voters. Of those votes, 104,404 were declared invalid. Karzai took 4,443,029 votes, 55.4 percent of the total cast. His closest challenger, Yonous Qanooni, was second with 1,306,503 votes, 16.3 percent. Sixteen other candidates ran. Karzai dismissed complaints that some of the voting fell along regional or ethnic lines, saying such a pattern was only natural, particularly in the absence of political parties. "Afghanistan has to travel many, many years before we can have the kind of vote that you experience in other countries in Europe or in America," he said. "For Afghanistan to have an election for the first time and experience such a voting, I would consider that a very national vote." Karzai pledged his government would "respect the constitution" and serve all Afghans. "The Afghan people have voted for a government based on laws, based on institutions, and that is what we are going to provide to them -- a government based on the constitution of Afghanistan and ... that will work for strengthening of the Afghan army, the police, and other institutions of the state," he said. "We will be serving the whole of this country, each individual of this country, wherever he or she may be," Karzai said. "We are going to be in service of the whole of Afghanistan -- every corner of the country, every province of the country, every village, street, every home of Afghanistan, every individual. We are going serve them all." State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said Wednesday the next steps in Afghanistan are elections for parliament and local governments, to be held late in the northern spring. Northern spring? |
| Posted by:Dan Darling |
| #1 Betcha this went through an Australian editor or writer. Thus the "northern spring", which is Aussie-talk. |
| Posted by: Mitch H. 2004-11-05 11:49:55 AM |