KABUL, May 27: Afghanistan’s parliament rejected on Saturday President Hamid Karzai’s nomination for the post of chief justice, a religious hardliner who has held the job for four years.

The appointment of Fazel Hadi Shinwari, who took the post soon after the Taliban government was removed in 2001, was defeated by 117 votes to 77 and after a long debate in the five-month-old assembly.

The reasons included his advanced age and lack of formal education, and the pervasive corruption in the Afghan judiciary, parliamentarians said.

With the vote the parliament had ‘drawn a clear line’ under the past, legislator Shukria Barikzai said afterwards.

They had ‘proven they want to end fundamentalism and that they want the judiciary to be separate from political games’, she said, with Shinwari’s defeat free of the usual political wrangling.

“Congratulations to the whole Afghan nation,” Ms Barikzai said.

Mr Shinwari’s appointment in 2002 alarmed some human rights groups because he was known for being almost as militant as the Taliban government.

The parliament has approved only two out of nine nominations to the Supreme Court, rejecting three because they have dual citizenship. The president will have to present other nominations to parliament. —AFP