The scheduling of a Nov. 7 presidential election runoff in Afghanistan leaves authorities little time to make improvements in the election process, but there are a number of steps that can be taken to avoid the major problems of the Aug. 20 polls, the National Democratic Institute (NDI) said today.

In preparation for elections in southern Sudan next April, the Sudanese Network for Democratic Elections (SuNDE) has concluded a successful two-week voter education campaign, conducting 375 events in 37 counties in all 10 states of southern Sudan.

A new NDI report on the democratic transition in Bosnia-Herzegovina highlights the country's post-war and post-communist legacies. It notes that governmental reforms under discussion, while critical, are not sufficient to address the challenges that Bosnia's political institutions and civil society must tackle to put the country firmly on a democratic path.

Chronically underrepresented in the political life of El Salvador, women from a cross section of national political parties came together recently in San Salvador to lay out a National Legislative Assembly program to move the nation toward more gender equity.