Last week, under the watchful eyes of 15,000 U.N. peacekeepers, Liberians voted for a president and, perhaps, for a better future. Former Finance Minister Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, who earned a master's degree in public administration at Harvard, seems poised to become Africa's first elected female president. But her rival, George Weah, a millionaire soccer superstar untainted by ties to past governments, is charging voting fraud.
A Bit of Luxury in a War-Scarred City Good news for the diplomats, international bureaucrats, business executives, and other expense-account visitors to Kabul. Afghanistan 's war-scarred capital gets its first five-star hotel, the 177-room Kabul Serena, which is attached to a new office building and a shopping mall known for having the only escalators in the country. Room rates at the hotel, which will employ more than 350 Afghans, start at $250 a night--five times what an Afghan government employee earns in a month. The hotel's financial backer is the Aga Khan Development Network, humanitarian agencies run under the auspices of the Aga Khan, spiritual leader of 20 million Ismaili Muslims worldwide. The Taliban regime killed members of the minority Ismaili sect, and thousands fled the country.
With Thomas Omestad, Larry Derfner and Associated Press
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