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The government of Afghanistan has beefed up security measures ahead of presidential inauguration scheduled for Sept. 29 here.
Security personnel have been deployed along the roads leading to the capital city Kabul strictly, checking all cars and vehicles entering the city.
Police and other security personnel in several parts of Kabul city put on high alert, checking the cars and suspicious persons roaming on the streets.
The swearing-in ceremony of the new president has been planned for Monday during which the outgoing president Hamid Karzai transfers power to the new president Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai and thus the conflict-ridden Afghanistan experiencing the first-ever peaceful power transition in its history.
Some 1,400 national and international dignitaries, including 200 delegates from the United States, China, Pakistan, India and other countries, will attend the first-ever peaceful power transition ceremony in Afghanistan.
Karzai, who had ruled the country over the past 13 years, in his last farewell speech to the nation broadcast live by national television on Sunday night, said that he is going to relinquish power Monday.
"I going to transfer the power to the new elected president tomorrow and would begin my new life as a citizen of Afghanistan here in the country," Karzai said in his last but short speech to the nation.
The election commission on Sept. 21 announced Ghani Ahmadzai as successor to the outgoing President Hamid Karzai and his election challenger Abdullah Abdullah as chief executive, a post equal to that of Prime Minister in the national unity government agreed upon by the duo, after more than a three-month standoff over disputed election results that had put the strife-torn country at the verge of worst crisis.
After taking oath as president of the country, Ghani Ahmadzai will announce the chief executive post in a decree, enabling Abdullah to take oath as chief executive in the national unity government, an administration far different to Karzai's all- powerful presidency.
The new government under President Ghani Ahmadzai, will sign the Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) with Washington on Tuesday to allow limited number of the U.S. troops to remain in Afghanistan after 2014 withdrawal of the NATO-led forces from the country, the outgoing president's national security advisor Rangin Dadfar Spanta revealed Saturday.
