It's my understanding that, even today, there may have been some conversation between the two of them, Senator John Kerry, Chairman of the powerful Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told reporters at the White House after his meeting with US President Barack Obama. He briefed Obama on his recent visit to Pakistan and Afghanistan.
Kerry said he met both Karzai and Dr Abdullah during his stay in Kabul, but refrain from talking to them on this issue as this could have sent a wrong signal. I specifically did not discuss, nor did I even attempt to put on the table the concept of a coalition. That would have been inappropriate, he said.
When asked about his conversation with Karzai, he said the Afghan President asked for assurances, that the US will help work to guarantee that there is not a repetition of what happened in the last election.
I know that Ambassador (Karl) Eikenberry is working even as we speak, today, to bring people together in order to learn the lessons of the last election, to bring the various election commissions together, and to do the best thing possible to try to guarantee that there's no repeat, he said.
This is a very tough environment in which to hold an election. And there are some serious security risks, which we all understand. Soldiers lost their lives in the last round trying to protect the right of Afghans to vote, he said.
During his meeting with Dr Abdullah, Kerry said they talked about restoring confidence to the government. We talked about the government reforms that he thinks are necessary in order to deliver good governance in Afghanistan. But we didn't get into the counterinsurgency and military components of it, he said.
Kerry said the run-off is a very significant moment where Afghanistan has an opportunity to be able to reestablish the credibility of its governance and begin to move on a number of challenges that are critical to whatever the United States' decisions are with respect to troops, Al Qaida or anything else.
I do believe that what I learned in Afghanistan and Pakistan confirmed to me overwhelmingly, without any doubt, that the president has been absolutely correct to take this time in order to allow some of these events to unfold and in order to be able to examine our strategy, he said.
I personally do not believe the strategy is defined merely by numbers of troops. That is the wrong focus, though numbers of troops will be important to a strategy. The strategy is focused on our ability to be able to have the Afghans themselves take control of this future. And the rate at which that can happen is critical, Kerry said.
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