President Hamid Karzai accused the West on Thursday of trying to ruin Afghanistan's elections, intensifying a showdown with parliament over whether foreigners will oversee a parliamentary vote this year. Karzai's international reputation took a beating after a UN-backed fraud watchdog threw out a third of the votes cast for him in last year's presidential election.
He is now wrangling with parliament and the United Nations over fraud protection measures for a parliamentary vote due in September. "Foreigners will make excuses, they do not want us to have a parliamentary election," a defiant Karzai told a gathering of election officials. "They want parliament to be weakened and battered, and for me to be an ineffective president and for parliament to be ineffective.
"You have gone through the kind of elections during which you were not only threatened with terror, you also faced massive interference from foreigners," Karzai told the officials. "Some embassies also tried to bribe the members of the commission." In Washington, State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley rejected Karzai's accusations the West wanted to see the Afghan parliament weakened and for him to be ineffective.
"We do not accept that judgement," Crowley said. What was important, said Crowley, was that Karzai be seen by his own people as governing effectively and that he take "measurable" steps against corruption. "Karzai has to step forward," Crowley told reporters.