Majority of Karzai cabinet nominees rejected

Afghanistan's parliament has dealt a stinging rebuke to President Hamid Karzai by rejecting 70 per cent of his nominees for a new cabinet.

The Saturday voting in which 17 of 24 nominees were turned down confronts Karzai with a severe challenge as he tries to get his second term in office into full swing.

Among those rejected were the incumbent women's affairs minister — the only female in the cabinet — and the incumbent energy minister, a warlord from a western province whose presence in the cabinet was widely seen as a sign of Karzai being beholden to regional power-brokers.

Karzai has said he will propose new nominees for the unfilled positions, but it is unclear when he will do so.