FROM a leafy tree in the centre of Kabul, two portraits gaze down on passers-by: one the stern glare of the white-bearded man in a turban, the other the beaming face of a young woman draped in a vibrant yellow headscarf.

One is Abdul Rasul Sayyaf, a notorious warlord condemned by many as a war criminal for the torture, rape and murder of thousands during the long years of the Afghan civil war.

The other is Sabrina Saghbe, a young former refugee who fled the conflict and returned last year to make her name as a basketball star before becoming the youngest candidate to run for parliamentary elections.

As Afghanistan prepares to vote in its first parliament in more than three decades, its people face a bewildering choice between 400 candidates in Kabul alone, and 2,800 across the country, from the notorious to the unknown. But few pairs of faces amid the dizzying patchwork of election posters better sum up what is at stake: a choice between a new beginning or a return to the ways of old.

“We hope that this parliament will bring a new era for us,” Abdul Ghias, 43, said as he surveyed the portraits. “We want to see new people like her given a chance, because we are tired of the old ways of the gun.”

For many yearning for change, the mere fact that an unknown young woman such as Miss Saghbe could stand for office at all is indicative of the huge progress Afghanistan has already made in the years since the Taleban fell. Each evening crowds of students, shopkeepers and curious passers-by who have learnt about her campaign through posters, television and word of mouth drop by her office to hear her talk. In a matter of weeks, she has become a poster child for a new generation hungry for a different Afghanistan. “Everything in Afghanistan is changing now,” she tells them as they listen intently. “And it is the young generation that is driving it.”

For some, however, the fact that the country’s most notorious warlord has been allowed to share the ballot with her is a sign of just how little has really changed. Human rights activists are furious at the election laws that allowed Mr Sayyaf to slip through the net despite well-documented accusations of appalling atrocities committed by his troops.

“He is a cancer upon this country,” Sam Zarifi, of Human Rights Watch, said. “It’s outrageous that he’s been allowed to stand. The Government and the international community have missed a golden opportunity to sideline guys like him.”

Mr Sayyaf already enjoys considerable legitimacy despite his appalling human rights record, having been appointed as an adviser to President Karzai, who has attracted considerable ire over the past few years for his mollycoddling of alleged war criminals.

This week Mr Karzai defended the decision to allow so many alleged warlords to stand, arguing that it was in the interests of national reconciliation, and that if voters did not like what they had done they could simply not vote for them. “It is not a compromise. It is healing a wound. It’s bringing the nation back together,” he argued. “If I consider somebody a criminal, I will not vote for him or her. The same can be done by every other Afghan.”

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Commander Rocketi, a notorious former Taleban commander named for his skill with a grenade launcher, agrees. After spending eight months in an American jail in Afghanistan he emerged to rejoin the Government and now tries to persuade Taleban commanders still fighting that the time has come to lay down their guns. “It’s time to make Afghanistan one nation,” he said, “not to accuse each other.”

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