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Afghanistan postpones parliamentary elections
Under strong international pressure to reform Afghanistan's electoral system before holding another nationwide vote, the government of President Hamid Karzai on Sunday put off balloting for a new parliament until September.
Election officials and Karzai had said the voting would take place in May, but Western diplomats had made it clear that their governments would refuse to pick up the tab for any balloting held before "root-and-branch" electoral reforms.
The West was dismayed and embarrassed by August's fraud-tarred presidential election, which had a price tag of about $120 million. Virtually the entire cost was borne by the international community. Karzai was eventually declared the winner, but about 1 million votes -- a third of the ballots cast for him -- were thrown out by an auditing panel.