abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=151668
Afghan election staff stand behind ballot boxes full of votes at Herat's main mosque polling station in the first direct presidential election in Herat, Afghanistan on Saturday, Oct. In the end, faulty ink not Taliban bombs and bullets threatened three yea rs of painstaking progress toward democracy. The opposition candidates c laimed the ink used to mark people's thumbs rubbed off too easily, allow ing for mass deception. But the controversy nonetheless cast a pall over what had been a joyous d ay in Afghanistan. Millions of ethnically diverse Afghan voters crammed polling stations for an election aimed at bringing peace and prosperity to a country nearly ruined by more than two decades of war. Men and wome n voted at separate booths in keeping with this nation's conservative Is lamic leanings.
Person of the Week: Wangari Maathai Karzai who is widely favored to win said the fate of the balloting was wi th electoral panel, but he added that, in his view, "the election was fr ee and fair it is very legitimate." "Who is more important, these 15 candidates, or the millions of people wh o turned out today to vote?" "Both myself and all these 15 candidates should respect our people because in the dust and snow and ra in, they waited for hours and hours to vote." Even if the vote is ultimately validated, Karzai's ability to unite this nation, fight rampant warlordism and crush a lingering Taliban insurgenc y in this nation of an estimated 25 million people might be fatally comp romised if his opponents refuse to accept the results and insist that hi s rule is illegitimate. Taliban rebels got into a skirmish with US troops that left at least 25 insurgents dead, and managed to kill three Afghan policemen accompanyin g ballots back to a counting center after the vote. Eight more police an d two civilians died when their vehicles ran over mines. But the rebels did not muster anything approaching the massive attack the y had threatened to derail the election. The boycott was a blow to the international community, which spent almost $200 million staging the vote. At least 12 election workers, and dozens of Afghan security forces, died in the past few months as the nation ge ared up for the vote. The chaos also threatened to become part of the debate in the US presid ential campaign. President Bush has held Afghanistan up as an example of flourishing democracy and a precursor to elections his administration i nsists will move forward in January in Iraq, despite continuing violence there. Louis, the president exulted in the Afghan vote as a "marvelous th ing" and said his administration should receive at least partial credit. "Freedom is powerful," Bush told a Republican breakfast fund-raiser. "Thi nk about a society in which young girls couldn't go to school, and their mothers were whipped in the public square, and today they're holding a presidential election." It was a starkly different scene in Kabul, where the opposition candidate s met at the house of Uzbek candidate Abdul Satar Sirat and signed a pet ition saying they would not recognize the vote results. Sirat, an ex-aide to Afghanistan's last king and a minor candidate expect ed to poll in the low single-digits, said all 15 challengers to Karzai a greed to the boycott. It should be stopped and we don't recognize the results," Sirat said. "This vote is a fraud and a ny government formed from it is illegitimate." Islamic poet Abdul Latif Padran, another minor candidate, said, "Today wa s a very black day. Today was the occupation of Afghanistan by America t hrough elections." Election officials acknowledged that workers at some voting stations mist akenly swapped the permanent ink meant to mark thumbs with normal ink me ant for ballots but insisted the problem was caught quickly. "There have been some technical problems but o verall it has been safe and orderly." Kennedy said it could take time for the electoral body to reach a decisio n on the vote's legitimacy. Initial results were not expected until late Sunday or early Monday, and anything approaching a full count could tak e two weeks. About 105 million registration cards were handed out for the election, a staggering number that UN and Afghan officials say was inflated by wi despread double registration. Organizers had argued that the indelible i nk would prevent people from voting twice. A 13-member US observer team from the bipartisan International Republic an Institute described the polls as "a triumph for the Afghan people." "It is not surprising that some of the candidates are raising the questio n (about the ink)," said former US Assistant Secretary of State Bernar d Aaronson, the team's co-leader. "Perhaps some of those who don't do so well are trying to provide an excuse for why they didn't do so well." The European Union and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in E urope sent observer missions as well. US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad arrived at the opposition camp to meet w ith Sirat, making no comment other than to say he was there "only to hel p" Khalilzad, a naturalized US citizen born in Afghanistan, has been widel y criticized for perceived favoritism for Karzai and is seen by many Afg hans as a puppet-master. Afghans gathered outside the house joked that a resolution to the crisis was near because "the big man has arrived." Later, the ambassador issued a statement calling the elections "a profoun d success." He said initial indications pointed to turnout that was "ext raordinarily high." "We recognize that some allegations remain and that there should be a pro cess to address these allegations through a thorough and transparent inv estigation," Khalilzad said. But he also warned, "For Afghanistan to win, the losers in the election s hould not undermine the achievement of the Afghan people." It is for my grandchildren," said Nuzko, 58, a widow who stood in line at a Kabul voting station. Associated Press reporters Stephen Graham in Kandahar, Burt Herman in Maz ar-e-Sharif and Amir Shah and Daniel Cooney in Kabul contributed to this report. This material m ay not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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