Afghanistan's Karzai becomes first-time dad

KABUL, Jan 26 (Reuters) Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai has become a father for the first time at the age of 49, palace officials said today.

Karzai's wife, Zeenat, who he married in 1999 in exile in Pakistan, gave birth to their son yesterday night in a Kabul hospital.

''The baby is named as Mirwais, after an old hero of Afghanistan,'' Karzai spokesman Karim Rahimi said.

''The president is very happy.'' Officials said mother and son were healthy.

Zeenat Karzai was working as a doctor with Afghan refugees in Pakistan when the couple married. She rarely appears in public or at official functions because of conservative Afghan Islamic tradition.

REUTERS SSC VC1715