WASHINGTON (PAN): The United States can do business with the new Karzai cabinet despite reservations about some of its members, two top US officials said Tuesday in their first public reaction to the newly introduced ministers by President Hamid Karzai last week. This is a government that we think broadly we can do business with, the Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs, P J Crowley, said at a news conference. There are a number of familiar faces, and we think a number of ministers have been retained who are quite effectively helping to build a stronger Afghan Government and extend its influence to greater sections of the country, he said. However, Crowley acknowledged that Americas judgment is not universal regarding every single minister that Karzai has announced. We like many of the choices that hes made. We have concerns about some of the choices that hes made, he said. We have said to President Karzai, quite specifically, that we remain concerned about the performance of his government and will be both working with him directly, but also judging as we go on the progress that is being made, and we will continue our process of certifying very specific ministries and channeling our assistance through those ministries that we think are being run well and address the concerns that we have for performance and corruption, Crowley said. Well continue to work with the government, and more specifically, in particular, well continue to channel our support through those ministries that we think have the kind of standards of accountability that we think is important, he said. Earlier in an interview to the Charlie Rose show of the PBS news channel, Richard Holbrooke, the Special US Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan, said: Let me be clear in this. We're not equally confident of every minister. There are ministers that have more importance in the war effort than others. Holbrooke said: I want to be very clear on this government and I want to state it as flatly as I can -- this is a government we can work with and we will work with it. Praising a number of ministers in the new government, Holbrooke said: There are some excellent ministers in it. When Hillary Clinton and I were in Kabul on November 18th, 19th, and 20th, we met with some of these ministers, a terrific agricultural minister who's been reaffirmed. Interior, defense, finance, education, health, these are all first-rate ministers. Noting that stamping out corruption in a country is highly desirable, Holbrooke said: But we are not fighting in Afghanistan to eliminate corruption. We are trying to reduce corruption in order for the military effort to succeed. Even in this country eliminating corruption is a constant struggle. lkj/ma