Taliban vow to disrupt Afghanistan election

KABUL: Afghanistan’s Taliban said on Sunday they would attempt to disrupt elections this month and warned Afghans to boycott the vote, the first explicit threat against the poll by the hardline Islamists.

The threat came just a day after Afghan President Hamid Karzai said he would soon announce members of a peace council to pursue talks with the Taliban, another step in his plan for reconciliation with the insurgents.

The Sept. 18 parliamentary election is seen as a litmus test of stability in Afghanistan before U.S. President Barack Obama conducts a war strategy review in December that will examine the pace and scale of U.S. troop withdrawals from July 2011.

Despite the presence of almost 150,000 foreign troops, violence is at its worst across Afghanistan since the Taliban were ousted by U.S.-backed Afghan forces in late 2001.

“This (poll) is a