KABUL, Afghanistan: Hamid Karzai, Afghan President, on Saturday has defended a new family law for the country's Shiite community, saying the concerns expressed by the international society over its anti-women's rights articles were based on poor translation or "misinterpretation."

Recently passed by parliament and signed by Karzai, the new law is meant to legalize the Shiite family law. It has sparked outcries among some Afghan women's rights activists and the international community.

According to critics the new law barred women from leaving their houses without the permission of their husbands.

Several western countries also expressed their concerns and asked Karzai to amend the law.

The US State Department asked Karzai to review and correct provisions that restrict women's rights, while Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon called the law "extremely alarming and troublesome" for NATO allies."

In a statement, the United Nations' agency for women UNIFEM said that it remained concerned and called for the amendments of the law.

Addressing a news conference in his president palace on Saturday Karzai told journalists: "We understand the concerns of our allies in the international community.".

"Those concerns maybe out of inappropriate or not so good translation of the law or misinterpretation of this," he added.

The 130th article of the law says that women can go out of their houses for "legal purposes," Karzai said, adding, "So this article does not prevent women from going out and what is reported in western media is not true."

Karzai said that he had asked the minister of justice to "study the whole law, every item of it very, very carefully and if there is anything that is of concern to us then we will definitely take action in consultation with our Ulema (Islamic clerics) and send it back to parliament."

A leading Shiite cleric, Hayatullah Shaikh Mohammad Asif Mohsini, also defended the law.

He complained that the demands for a pure Shiite law, which included a separate family court, different from that of Sunnis were not accepted by the parliament.

An Afghan female lawmaker believed that by passing law, Karzai wanted to gain the support of Shiites in his re-election bid in the next presidential elections slated for August 20.

"We all know that the election is coming and Karzai just accepted this demand of Shiite clerics to win their support in the next presidential election," Shinkai Karokhail, a female member of lower house of parliament said.

Unlike in case of other laws that the MPs read each article and vote for them, the Shiite Family Law was approved as a package, Karokhail said, adding, "It was the only law that was approved as a package."

But Karzai at Saturday's media briefing hinted that the outcry by the media came on the same day when he was attending an international conference on future of Afghanistan in The Hague, Netherlands.