WASHINGTON (AP) -- The United States built pressure on Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Wednesday, signaling that a troop increase could articulation on a successful runoff acclamation and that the Obama administering would be receptive to a power-sharing accord amid Karzai and his chief rival.
A affiliation government or added political arrangement that included Karzai's rival, former Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah, could accommodate a critical internal check on Karzai, who is broadly advantaged to win the presidential runoff set for Nov. 7.
President Barack Obama and Sen. John Kerry, who pressed the administration's interests in weekend talks with Karzai in Kabul, both hinted Wednesday that pending deliberations on accessible U.S. troop increases in Afghanistan could be affected by the Afghan leader's behavior.
Karzai's weak and corruption-riddled government has been blamed in part for the resurgence of the Taliban and for widespread Afghan civilian disillusionment. The Afghan national acclamation in August was bedridden by massive fraud that led to the auctioning of a third of the results, providing a block for the U.S. to columnist Karzai to accede to the runoff with Abdullah.
Kerry, whose meetings with Karzai helped advance to the runoff agreement over the weekend, said Wednesday afterwards a White House session with Obama that the president should wait until afterwards new acclamation to make his accommodation on troop strength.
Obama himself said Wednesday in a television account he might not announce his accommodation on sending added troops until afterwards the runoff.
Both statements had the subtle force of accretion pre! ssure on Karzai by implying that the administration's accommodation on U.S. troop backbone in Afghanistan might depend on how the runoff turns out.
The Massachusetts Democrat said Wednesday that it wasn't "common sense" for Obama to determine whether added U.S. troops should go to Afghanistan afterwards knowing the acclamation results. "You really appetite to apperceive that this has worked, and you appetite to apperceive what's coming out of it," Kerry said.
Officials said Obama's pending accommodation had acutely figured in the U.S. discussions with Karzai about how to resolve the political impasse.
Several admiral stressed that the looming troop plan accommodation was not used candidly to force Karzai to concede on the election's contested first round, but one highly placed U.S. official in Afghanistan said the United States used Obama's deliberation over troop numbers as leverage.
That official spoke on action of anonymity because Obama has not appear whether he will accede to a U.S. military request for bags of additional forces.
Karzai and Abdullah settled on the runoff following weeks of acrimony over Afghanistan's fraud-pocked national election. But both sides additionally are considering a affiliation government that could either replace the runoff or follow it.
State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters Wednesday that the U.S. would not be opposed to a power-sharing deal, depending on its legitimacy and how it was implemented. Obama appeared to allude to the still-fluid discussions Wednesday.
"I think we're still in - finding out how this accomplished action in Afghanistan is activity to unfold," Obama said in an account on MSNBC.
While careful to say that any power-sharing accord would have to appear from the Afghans and not the U.S., American admiral were clear that Karzai's afraid accep! tance of a runoff vote may not be abundant by itself.
Karzai and Abdullah have about dismissed the abstraction of sharing power, but there have been reports of private horse-trading discussions afore and since Tuesday's announcement of the runoff.
Kerry told reporters afterwards affair with Obama on Wednesday that in Afghanistan he "did not altercate nor did I even attempt to put on the table the abstraction of a coalition."
It would be inappropriate to raise that possibility and would make it seem to Afghans that the United States was calling the shots, Kerry said. However, he accustomed the issue was being discussed in Kabul, and said there may have been talks amid the Karzai and Abdullah camps on it "even today."
In an account Wednesday with The Associated Press, Kerry said the discussions with Karzai grew intense at times.
"I turned up the dial a few times, accept me," Kerry said.
He added: "They were actual emotional. And they were actual amorous and actual heated at times but accurately heated. You apperceive there was never anger, there was always the intensity of the argument."
Another State Department official said Abdullah's camp had bidding absorption in a affiliation or power-sharing deal, and that some Karzai aides, concerned about the after-effects of a runoff, are accommodating to accede the abstraction admitting the president's public repudiation of the idea.
That official said the U.S. would support any advance that leads to the formation of a credible government in the eyes of the Afghan people. The official spoke on action of anonymity because the negotiations don't involve the U.S.
That could include a affiliation or added power-sharing arrangement that is either formed to annihilate the need for a second annular or one that is created using the after-effects of ! the runo ff.
But there are no accoutrement for a affiliation in the Afghan Constitution, and it is not clear how such a accord would work or remain enforceable.
The most important near-term goal for the U.S. was Karzai's acceptance of acclamation agency after-effects and his acceptance that the impasse must be resolved.
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Associated Press writers Jennifer Loven, Laurie Kellman, Ron Fournier and Julie Pace in Washington and Robert H. Reid in Kabul contributed to this report.
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