Afghan elections face delay

Afghanistan’s parliamentary elections face delay after the government failed to resolve issues including the voting system for its first post-Taliban legislature ahead of a key deadline, the United Nations said today.

The vote was slated for the Afghan month of Saur, which ends on May 21. The exact election date must be declared at least 90 days in advance – meaning the deadline passed at the end of last week.

“We are already into the 90-day period,” UN spokesman Manoel de Almeida e Silva said at a news conference. “According to the law, the legislative elections will not be able to take place in the month of Saur.”

The hold-up is the latest bump in Afghanistan’s fast-track to democracy laid down in UN-backed political accords after US bombs drove out the former Taliban government in late 2001.

Both presidential and parliamentary elections were originally scheduled for June 2004 but were put off because of logistical difficulties and insecurity.

President Hamid Karzai won the presidential vote in October with a landslide, but concern about a further delay to the new parliament have grown amid lagging UN preparations and the government’s failure to take tricky decisions.

Officials are still wrestling with whether to ditch the planned voting system, which favours independents such as former warlords, to one which offers greater chances to the country’s re-emerging political parties.

Government officials have suggested the vote can take place in the summer, but some diplomats are predicting a September polling day.