Karzai Victorious After Fraud Probe
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
KABUL, Afghanistan – Hamid Karzai was officially declared Afghanistan’s first-ever popularly elected president yesterday after a weeks-long fraud probe found no reason to overturn his landslide victory.
While the American-backed leader made an immediate call for unity, his closest rivals refused to concede, undermining hopes for political stability in a country racked by ethnic mistrust.
The U.N.-sponsored electoral board, confirming the results of the October 9 vote, said Mr. Karzai had won a five-year term with 55.4%, 39 percentage points more than his nearest rival. It was the first national ballot since the fall of the Taliban three years ago.
“His excellency Hamid Karzai is the winner,” board chairman Zakim Shah said at a ceremony broadcast live on Afghan state TV. “We are announcing the first elected president of Afghanistan.”
In Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said: “We congratulate President Hamid Karzai on his election as Afghanistan’s first democratically elected president and we look forward to his inauguration next month.”
Britain, Germany, and France also wished Mr. Karzai well.
High turnout and the lack of major violence on polling day “demonstrates the scale of the transformation that has already taken place in Afghanistan in the three years since the overthrow of the Taliban,” Prime Minister Blair said.
NATO chief Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, who bulked up the alliance’s Afghan security force during the poll, said he looked forward to working with Mr. Karzai “in helping Afghanistan build a better, safer future.”
The election itself was delayed from June because of insecurity and logistical problems. The result was then held up by weeks of mudslinging by Mr. Karzai’s challengers who threatened to boycott the outcome.
In its final report released yesterday, the panel confirmed problems with ballot stuffing and with ink used to mark people’s fingers to prevent multiple voting.
But it said there was “no evidence” that the problems were widespread or that they favored only Mr. Karzai.
Separately, terrorists backed off a deadline to kill three U.N. hostages yesterday and suggested a Filipino may be spared because his country has no troops in Afghanistan.
Authorities said they were hopeful the three will eventually be released unharmed. But they had no confirmation of claims by the kidnappers that negotiations were under way and appealed yesterday to Afghans to provide information.
Annetta Flanigan of Northern Ireland, Filipino diplomat Angelito Nayan and Shqipe Hebibi of Kosovo were abducted in a daylight raid on their U.N. vehicle in the Afghan capital last Thursday.
The abductors had set a noon deadline to kill the hostages, but later pushed that back until midnight, or 2:30 p.m. EST. The new deadline passed without any announcement of their killings, and a purported spokesman for the kidnappers, Syed Khaled, said a decision would be made later today.
An obscure spin-off of Afghanistan’s ousted Taliban regime called the Jaishal Muslimeen, or Army of Muslims, has claimed responsibility for the kidnappings and on Sunday released a videotape of the frightened hostages in a sinister echo of the insurgency in Iraq.
However, Afghan officials suspect that warlords or criminal gangs were involved in the abduction and have launched a search operation in the capital and surrounding countryside.
Afghan state TV read out a list of telephone numbers on the evening news for ordinary Afghans to provide any leads that might help them locate the three.