Afghan president Karzai considering preponing elections

Kabul, April 13 (ANI): Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai has said that he was contemplating preponing the 2014 presidential elections, or accelerating the handing over of security to his forces.

During a joint news conference with NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen in Kabul, Karzai said that no decision had yet been taken.

He further said that any decision on bringing forward the election to 2013, or speeding up the transition would 'not be made soon'.

According to the BBC, Rasmussen said that as per the schedule the alliance was on track to hand over entire responsibility to the Afghan forces by the end of 2014.

He said that Afghan forces were now completely capable of establishing and maintaining peace in the country if Nato withdrew its forces.

Nato officials said that they hoped to build the Afghan police and army to a force of about 352,000 before scaling the number back to about 230,000, as the security threat faded and Western financial support shrunk.

However, Karzai said that depending on the training and readiness of the armed forces, Afghanistan would not consider reducing the number of security forces until at least 2015 or 2016. (ANI)