Afghanistan’s Ghani and Abdullah arrive for news conference with Kerry

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry shakes hands with Afghanistan's presidential candidate Ashraf Ghani (L) at the start of a meeting at the U.S. embassy in Kabul July 11, 2014. REUTERS/Jim Bourg reuters_tickers

KABUL (Reuters) – Rival Afghan presidential candidates Ashraf Ghani and Abdullah Abdullah arrived at a U.N. compound in Kabul on Saturday for a joint news conference with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry.

The long-awaited news conference follows two days of negotiations between the feuding candidates and Kerry over how to resolve a deadlock over a presidential election to pick a successor to incumbent Hamid Karzai.

(Reporting by Lesley Wroughton; Writing by Maria Golovnina; Editing by Kevin Liffey)