Afghanistan's forthcoming general election has been postponed for three months, Afghan transitional President Hamid Karzai said in Kabul Sunday.

"Both the presidential and parliamentary elections would be held simultaneously between the Afghan months of Sinbila and Mizanfalling in next September," he told reporters at the doorstep of his fortified office.

Karzai announced this decision ahead of an international donors' conference being held in Berlin from Wednesday to review Afghanistan's security and reconstruction process over the last two years.

The US-backed Afghan president at the head of high ranking delegation would attend the two-day conference concluded on first of April to highlight his government's achievements and requirements to get more international assistance.

Earlier, under the historic Bonn accord signed among the various Afghan factions in Germany in late 2001, the first-ever Afghan general elections in decades was scheduled for June 2004.

The plan, according to observers as well as UN officials, has been hitting snag as the increasing security incidents and continued warlordism holding sway in the vast rural areas.

So far out of 10.5 million eligible electorates slightly over 1.5 million people have registered their names with a few registration posts, according to UN officials.

Under a plan unveiled by Afghan Deputy Defense Minister General Abdul Rahim Wardak Saturday, around 40,000 former combatants affiliating with different warlords would be disarmed by the end of next June.

(Xinhua News Agency March 29, 2004)