Hamid Karzai was sworn in Tuesday as Afghanistan’s first popularly elected president, opening a new chapter for the impoverished country while warning that the wars against terrorism and drugs will require sustained international help. A smiling Karzai, wearing a traditional green robe and a black lambskin hat, received a standing ovation on his arrival. Vice President Dick Cheney, the highest-ranking American official to visit Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban in 2001, was among the 600 guests.After the Afghan national anthem reverberated around a restored hall of the war-damaged former royal palace, Karzai placed his right hand on a copy of the Quran, Islam’s holy book. He repeated an oath of allegiance read to him by Afghanistan’s white-bearded chief justice, Fazl Hadi Shinwari.Karzai then swore in his two deputies, Ahmad Zia Massood and Karim Khalili, members of the country’s two largest ethnic minorities. Full Story
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