ISLAMABAD: President Mamnoon Hussain will attend the swearing-in ceremony of Afghan President-designate Dr Ashraf Ghani on Monday.

In a statement on Sunday, Foreign Office spokesperson said that President Mamnoon would visit Kabul on the official invitation of the Afghan government.

The spokesperson congratulated the Afghan people and their leadership on the signing of an agreement on the national unity government and completion of the electoral process.

The president’s participation in the inauguration ceremony of Mr Ghani underscored Pakistan’s consistent support for peaceful democratic transition in Afghanistan, the spokesperson said.

She said the visit would contribute to strengthening of fraternal ties between the two countries.

Afghanistan will host a grand presidential inauguration on Monday, with former US-based academic Ashraf Ghani taking power as Nato troops end their 13-year war without defeating the fierce Taliban insurgency.

Mr Ghani succeeds outgoing President Hamid Karzai after a three-month standoff over disputed election results that fuelled the insurgency and worsened Afghanistan’s dire economic outlook.

The ceremony will be the country’s first democratic transfer of power – a benchmark seen by international donors as a key legacy of the costly military and civilian intervention since the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

Both Mr Ghani and his poll rival Abdullah Abdullah, a former anti-Taliban resistance fighter, claimed to have won the fraud-tainted June 14 run-off election, tipping Afghanistan into a crisis that threatened to trigger nationwide unrest.

But, under heavy pressure from the US and UN, the two candidates eventually agreed to form a national unity government, and Mr Ghani was declared president after an audit of all nearly eight million ballot papers.

Mr Abdullah will also be inaugurated on Monday as chief executive, a new role similar to a prime minister, in a government structure far different to Mr Karzai’s all-powerful presidency.

Both Mr Ghani and Mr Abdullah are moderate, pro-Western leaders who have vowed to push ahead with the patchy social and infrastructure progress since 2001, but the country still faces a major threat from Taliban.

Flags have been erected on Kabul’s main roads in one sign of preparations under way, and officials have vowed to host an elaborate event as Afghanistan enters a new era.

The schedule and guest list for the ceremony has not been revealed due to the risk of militant attacks.

Published in Dawn, September 29th , 2014