Karzai Aide Says Afghan Runoff Vote Is Likely

Karzai Aide Says Afghan Runoff Vote Is Likely
By ELISABETH BUMILLER and SABRINA TAVERNISE
Copyright by The Associated Press
Published: October 15, 2009
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/16/world/asia/16afghan.html?th&emc=th


WASHINGTON — The government of President Hamid Karzai is preparing for the likelihood that he will have to face an election runoff with his main challenger, Afghanistan’s ambassador here said Thursday, acknowledging an outcome that Western diplomats had been pushing for but that could complicate the debate over whether to send more American troops.

The comments by the ambassador in Washington, Said Tayeb Jawad, were the first in which Mr. Karzai’s government conceded that a runoff was likely, after weeks of investigation into stark cases of election fraud.

In an interview on Wednesday and in a follow-up telephone conversation on Thursday, Mr. Jawad said that although he had no direct contact with the commission auditing the vote, the Karzai government was preparing for the commission to announce Saturday that a runoff was necessary.

“Chances are there will be a second round, although it was not so sure up to a couple of days ago, but now it looks like there will be a second round,” Mr. Jawad said Wednesday.

Though a runoff could ease some questions about the legitimacy of the Afghan government, the Obama administration now faces the prospect of further delay in making a decision on increasing troop levels in Afghanistan, administration officials said Thursday. They said the potential runoff was dominating much of the continuing debate over Afghanistan policy in the White House.

An administration official, who requested anonymity to speak more openly about internal White House deliberations, said that while “it is quite legitimate to delay a decision on troops until you know what kind of government you’re dealing with,” President Obama’s advisers were in fact split over whether Mr. Obama should announce troop deployments without knowing who was in charge in Afghanistan or wait until the political situation in Kabul was clear.

Another complicating factor, administration officials said, is the prospect that there could be a power-sharing agreement between Mr. Karzai and his main opponent, Abdullah Abdullah. Both Mr. Abdullah and the Karzai government’s ambassador to Washington hinted at that possibility on Thursday.

The debate over the American strategy in Afghanistan has been the consuming foreign policy issue of the Obama presidency. In recent weeks, the president and his top diplomats and military advisers have been engaged in a remarkably public debate over the size of a future military force and how to deal with a Karzai government it has accused of corruption and ineptitude.

Administration officials have said they are not close to making a final decision, and some Republican critics have already accused them of moving too slowly.

Afghan and American officials said the earliest that a runoff vote could be held was late this month or early next month, with results expected about two weeks later. Some Afghans said, however, that the vote might have to be delayed because of bad winter weather until the spring, a nightmare situation for a White House that does not want to remain in limbo.

The new round of voting would also mean a repeat of the huge security operation that sought to keep the first round of voting, on Aug. 20, safe from insurgents’ attacks.

Until now, Mr. Obama’s advisers have said they expect a decision from him on additional troop deployments, perhaps as many as 40,000, within the next few weeks. Administration officials and Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the top NATO commander in Afghanistan, have said they have only 12 to 18 months to show progress in Afghanistan, where security has been steadily deteriorating and deaths of American and NATO troops are increasing.

Administration officials said that it was their understanding that an election commission would announce, probably in Kabul on Saturday, that after questionable ballots had been thrown out, Mr. Karzai had received only 48 percent of the vote, a tally that would mean a runoff was needed. The original vote has been marred by widespread evidence of fraud and ballot-stuffing for Mr. Karzai.

In a news conference in Kabul on Thursday, Mr. Abdullah hinted that he might be willing to negotiate a power-sharing deal with Mr. Karzai, but only after an announcement about whether a runoff election is needed.

“It will be a different environment, no doubt, once the announcement is made,” Mr. Abdullah said. “We reserve our reaction, and what to do post-announcement, for that period.”

In the interview in Washington on Wednesday, the Afghan ambassador did not discount the possibility of a deal between Mr. Karzai and Mr. Abdullah, but he said he viewed it with skepticism.

“That’s peaceable, that’s doable, that’s probably a good way to go politically, but whether it would make a huge difference as far as the reality on the ground, and as far as bringing more capable, skillful Afghans to the government, I doubt it,” Mr. Jawad said.

In the meantime, it is unclear whether any deal would be legally possible. The Afghan Constitution requires a runoff to be held in two weeks if no candidate receives more than half the vote.

But Afghanistan violated its Constitution as recently as the spring, when Mr. Karzai failed to hold elections within the time frame it mandated. To preserve his legitimacy, the Supreme Court ruled that Mr. Karzai could remain the legal head of state until a new one was selected, even though his term had expired.

“There might be some other miracle they could do,” said Wadir Safi, a professor at Kabul University.

In further evidence that Mr. Karzai was feeling vulnerable, his longtime ally Zalmay Khalilzad, a former American ambassador to Afghanistan, arrived in the country on Wednesday. A spokeswoman for the American Embassy in Kabul said that Mr. Khalilzad, an American citizen born in Afghanistan, had come as a “private citizen” and that he was not representing the United States government.

Relations between Mr. Karzai and Mr. Khalilzad, who also served as American ambassador in Iraq, became strained in the spring after Mr. Karzai reportedly led Mr. Khalilzad to believe he would get a government position and later dropped the offer.

The two men met Thursday morning, a spokesman for Mr. Karzai’s campaign said, but he gave no further details.

In a brief appearance on Afghan television on Wednesday, Mr. Khalilzad indicated that he had come to help Afghans during a difficult election process, but an official in Mr. Abdullah’s campaign said they did not want his assistance. “We do not need any broker,” the official said.

Elisabeth Bumiller reported from Washington, and Sabrina Tavernise from Kabul, Afghanistan. Mark Landler contributed reporting from Washington.