KABUL, 7 July 2004 — Presidential elections in Afghanistan should be possible by mid-October, the government said yesterday, but hinted that logistical problems might delay parliamentary polls supposed to be held simultaneously.

Speaking as news of a new militant attack on electoral registration efforts underlined the risks to the polls, presidential spokesman Jawed Ludin said the Cabinet was meeting yesterday to discuss the election date. An announcement of the date was expected from the UN-Afghan Joint Electoral Management Body by today, he said.

Senior election management body official Farouk Wardak said he was not sure the date would be announced so soon, as talks were continuing with political parties, the United Nations and others. “But Inshallah (God willing), we will have an announcement by the end of the week,” he said.

Ludin told a news conference the United Nations and the Election Commission had convinced the government it was possible to hold the presidential election “at the time and in the way it was planned, which makes us happy”.

“About parliamentary elections, they had ideas and worries,” he said, adding that the cabinet would discuss those concerns.

He said the government’s intention had been that both elections should be held at the same time, during the Afghan month of Mizan, which runs from Sept. 20 until Oct. 21. “According to the constitution, we should try to hold both elections at the same time and at that time that was fixed.”

However, referring to parliamentary polls, Ludin added: “If we could not hold them at the same time because of some logistical problems, we could hold them a day, one week, or one month later.”

Security worries and slow voter registration have already forced a delay in the elections from June and slow disarmament of factional militia forces has raised concerns about conditions for free and fair polls.

But analysts say pressure is coming from the United States to go ahead with the vote, as President George W. Bush appears to be hoping for a foreign policy success story from Afghanistan ahead of his November election bid to balance problems he has in Iraq.

The continued existence of factional armies is a particular concern for parliamentary polls and some politicians and diplomats have expressed concern that powerful warlords want to use an early vote to consolidate their positions.

The United Nations has said unless the polls are held by mid-October, they would have to be delayed until spring, given the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan and the onset of winter.

But a Western diplomat said selection of delegates for last year’s national constitutional assembly in December suggested there was more leeway on timing should the parliamentary poll need to be delayed.

President Hamid Karzai, who will contest the election and is widely expected to win, has said repeatedly he wants the polls held in September, but the election law requires a date to be announced 90 days in advance — a deadline already passed. Taleban and allied Islamic militants have vowed to derail elections they see as an exercise to consolidate the US-backed administration and have stepped up attacks in recent months.

Late on Monday, an Afghan election worker was shot in the leg in a raid by about 30 guerrillas on a voter registration office in the southern province of Kandahar, police said.

A Taleban bomb attack last month killed three women working to register female voters for the poll and the guerrillas killed 16 men found carrying voter registration cards.