Afghanistan: Blood and threats vote

Taliban attack in Kabul in two days by presidential elections. Two rockets were fired against the presidential palace without causing victims, as reported to the police. The attack started from Bagram, on the south side of the Afghan capital. "Both rockets hit areas near the presidential palace but fortunately caused no victims." It is the second attack in Kabul, after the last Saturday in front of the headquarters of NATO, where the attacks are rare given the military presence of thousands of Afghans and international forces.
ELECTIONS
The Election Commission flaunts optimism: only 442 seats in 7000 will remain closed after tomorrow, when the Afghan citizens are called to choose the new head of state and 34 provincial councils. For Zekria Barakzai, deputy director of the committee, is a major achievement, given that until a few days ago it was feared that the conditions of widespread insecurity in the country become inaccessible and unusable, a number much higher, around 700. Yet if you look at the recent past, there is little to be cheerful. In 2004 when we held the previous president in the seats that were not able to open only 100.
Feroci Rappresaglia
Most election offices that do not come into operation is concentrated in the southern province of Helmand, the heart of the revolt integrist. To discourage citizens from participating in an "American initiative," and not be complicit in a plan "anti-patriotic and anti-Islamic, the Taliban have repeatedly threatened to attack both the seats and the roads to get there. In recent days the language of intimidation became increasingly grim. The latest propaganda leaflets circulated the other night in some areas of the South, promised fierce reprisals against those who go to vote. "Cut nose and ears," say the rebels, and also 'the ink-stained fingers. " A clear reference to the stamp that is stamped on the thumb in the electorate to prevent the recurrence of the same person to vote a second time.
ACROBAZIE POLICIES
Many polling stations closed, the climate of fear in the south Afghanisan where diavampano many weeks bloody clashes between Taliban and Afghan and international troops. It is inevitable that the risk of abstention here is particularly high. A problem more for Hamid Karzai, the outgoing head of state, as are areas populated predominantly by people dell'etnia Pashtun, one of which has the largest potential number of supporters. For this reason in recent days Karzai has resumed a series of alliances with people whose democratic faith is often uncertain, however, able to assure him of support consisting of slices of the population. First obtained the support of Ismail Khan, the powerful former warlord who enjoys wide following in Herat. In extremis then drew exile Rashid Dostum, leader of the minority Uzbek undisputed that in 2004 when it introduced the candidate, got 10%.
THE POLLS
In exchange for the return, Dostum has urged her to vote for Karzai. Considering that the polls give him 45% of votes, the support of the Uzbek leader is valuable in order to overcome the quorum of 50% and avoid the ballot. Dostum is a very unpleasant picture of the rooms UN and NATO for the crimes that have been spotted before and after the fall of the theocratic regime. But Karzai seems disposed to any acrobatics policy not face in the second round the former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah, steadily in the polls. The latter is attributed 25% of the votes. Its popularity is largely overcoming the boundaries dell'etnia Tajik where it belongs.
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17 August 2009
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