Breakaway group to challenge Karzai leadership

DISGRUNTLED factions within Afghanistan’s coalition government have held a series of meetings to consider withdrawing their support for President Hamid Karzai in the run-up to elections next year, officials said yesterday.

The instability comes as this war-ravaged country's various ethnic and political groups try to agree on a new constitution that will lay the foundation for the first democratic elections in decades, scheduled for June.

The political wrangling also comes as Karzai grapples with a recent upsurge in attacks by Taliban and al-Qaida militants against American forces, aid workers and the US-backed government.