'I'm not mulling,' says Qayum Karzai about Afghan presidency

Baltimore restaurateur Qayum Karzai has taken issue with a New York Times report that he is "mulling" a run for the Afghan presidency, now occupied by his brother, Hamid Karzai, who is due to step down in 2014.

The news was included in Jim Risen's Sunday front-page story on the Karzai family.

"What makes Jim Risen say that I’m mulling?" said Qayum Karzai, speaking from Albuquerque, N.M. "My decision depends on truly whether I can help, but running for president for the sake of being elected is nonsense in America or Afghanistan. I’m not a politician."

Although Qayum Karzai has made his home in the United States since 1971, he has served in the Afghan parliament and advised his brother in an unofficial capacity. In 1985, he opened the Helmand Restaurant in Chicago, a forerunner to the widely admired restaurant of the same name on Charles Street in Baltimore, which opened in 1989.

His restaurant operations in Baltimore now include B, a bistro in Bolton Hill and Tapas Teatro, a Mediterranean small-plates restaurant in Charles North.