Push Made for Afghan Monarchy

Supporters of Mohammad Zaher Shah, the Afghan king ousted in 1973, announced Saturday the formation of a movement to press for restoration of the country’s monarchy, hours after Zaher Shah returned from medical treatment abroad.

The action came as sporadic fighting continued in the country, where the Taliban movement was deposed by U.S.-led forces in 2001.

The National Unity Movement, led by one of Zaher Shah’s cousins, Sultan Mahmoud Ghazi, invited other royalists to join it.

“But we want a democratic system without imposing our wish on people. We call on the government to launch a referendum and to let people decide,” said Hakim Noorzaye, deputy head of the new group.

Noorzaye also resigned from his post as deputy head of intelligence in the government of U.S.-backed President Hamid Karzai.

The nine founding members are either close relatives of Zaher Shah, like his sons Mirwais and Mustafa Zaher, or those who served the monarch during his 40-year rule.

Their call came just hours after the frail former king, 88, arrived from France, where he had been recovering from a broken leg.

Noorzaye criticized the Karzai administration as “a tool of warlords” and charged that a commission it appointed had already opted for a presidential system in a new constitution being secretly drafted.

Postwar violence continued amid the political maneuvering Saturday. Insurgents fired six rockets toward a U.S. base near the border with Pakistan, but no casualties or damage were reported, the military said.

U.S. forces responded with gunfire to the attack in Shkin in Paktika province, U.S. military spokesman Col. Rodney Davis said at Bagram air base.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization plans to take command of the international peacekeeping force in the capital, Kabul, on Monday. The deployment will be NATO’s first outside Europe since the organization was formed during the Cold War.