*EPF209 12/07/2004
Afghanistan Takes Huge Step Toward Democracy
(Hamid Karzai, the country's first popularly elected president, is sworn in) (400)

By Jane Morse
Washington File Staff Writer

Washington -- Afghanistan took a huge step toward democracy December 7 when Hamid Karzai was sworn in as the country's first popularly elected president. He had been formally elected October 9.

"We have now left a hard and dark past behind us, and today we are opening a new chapter in our history, in a spirit of friendship with the international community," Karzai said in his inaugural speech.

He took his oath of office with his right hand on a copy of the Qur'an, Islam's holy book, in the restored hall of the former royal place in Kabul, repeating the oath of allegiance as read to him by Afghanistan's chief justice, Fazi Hadi Shinwari.

Among the 600 guests at the inaugural ceremony were U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney, who is the highest-ranking American official to visit Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

"For the first time the people of this country are looking confident about the future of freedom and peace," Cheney told the press when he arrived at the U.S. base north of Kabul earlier in the day. "Freedom still has enemies here in Afghanistan, and you are here to make those enemies miserable."

Rumsfeld told the press en route to the inaugural ceremonies that the successful presidential election and the upcoming elections of Afghanistan's parliament "represent an important step forward for moderates, for principles of fairness to all elements" within the country. But in remarks to a group of special forces soldiers at Bagram, he cautioned: "there are still groups, extremists, that would like to take this country back -- the Taliban, the al-Qaida -- and use it for a base of terrorist activities around the world as they did on 9/11."

Karzai, in his inaugural address, praised the resilience of his fellow Afghans, who, he said, were "determined to leave behind the suffering and oppression they once endured and move forward to rebuild this great nation."

Karzai acknowledged the continuing threats posed by extremism, terrorism and narcotics, and promised to combat them during his five-year term in office. He said his administration would work to make good campaign promises to eradicate poverty, improve public services, protect civil liberties and human rights and root out corruption.

(The Washington File is a product of the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)

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