‘Perfect’ elections not possible: US

WASHINGTON—The Bush Administration has underlined the need for free and fair elections in Pakistan but recognizes that it is not possible to have a “perfect” election.
“They (Rice and Musharraf) talked about the internal situation in Pakistan. The secretary talked to President Musharraf about how he saw the situation in Pakistan, how he saw the election process and the politics playing out.”
“She urged President Musharraf to conduct elections in such a way that the Pakistani people have confidence in it,” US State Department spokesman Sean Mccormack said when asked about the meeting of Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice with President Musharraf in Davos Switzerland.
Mccormack, while commenting to the views of Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Richard Boucher which he made before a Congressional sub-committee Tuesday where he held the possibility of fraud in the forthcoming parliamentary elections, said, “Pakistan, as we know, throughout its history has had various irregularities to a greater or lesser extent in their electoral process. We don’t have perfect elections. I don’t think there is such a thing as a perfect election.” President Musharraf, in Davos, talked about the importance of having a secure atmosphere during the elections, so that people could participate in it and talked about the US-Pakistan efforts on counter-terrorism, he added.—Online