By Paul Ames
The Associated Press, 08 December 2005
BRUSSELS, Belgium -- NATO foreign ministers approved plans Thursday to send up to 6,000 troops into southern Afghanistan, a major expansion of the alliance's peacekeeping mission into some of the most dangerous parts of the country.
The deployment next year of mostly European and Canadian troops will free up U.S. forces to focus on counterinsurgency operations against Taliban and al-Qaida fighters in Afghanistan's volatile south and east.
"They will bring peace to more people in Afghanistan," said NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer. "They will help ensure that terrorism cannot take hold again of this country and use it as a base from which to threaten the world."
NATO's expansion should allow the United States to scale back its about 18,000-strong military presence almost five years after it invaded the country following the Sept. 11 attacks on New York and Washington. The Pentagon, however, has yet to say how many troops it will withdraw.
The plans give the NATO peacekeepers a stronger self-defense mandate, guarantee support from U.S. combat troops if they face a serious attack and set out rules for handling detainees - all issues that have concerned some European allies mulling participation in the expanded force.
Ministers also agreed to a request from Afghan President Hamid Karzai to develop increased support in developing his country's fledgling security forces and the Defense Ministry.
"NATO wants to work on a long-term plan of security cooperation and training and support for Afghanistan to help reform and strengthen its defense institutions," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told a news conference.
De Hoop Scheffer appealed for the European Union, United Nations and the G-8 group of economic powers to help by doing more to help rebuild the country's economy. A conference is planned for late January in London to relaunch development efforts.
"NATO cannot do it all by itself," he told reporters. "What Afghanistan needs the commitment of the entire international community."
The military expansion will take NATO's peacekeeping mission to about 16,000 and make it responsible for security in about three-quarters of the country. The separate U.S.-led combat force will keep the lead role in the eastern sector where Taliban holdouts have been most active.
Violence has persisted in southern Afghanistan in recent weeks. Hostile fire forced two U.S. military helicopters to make emergency landings Sunday, and NATO-led forces have been targeted in the areas where they already operate.
The extra NATO troops are scheduled to start moving into southern Afghanistan around May. Britain will play a lead role in the region, running a headquarters in the main southern city of Kandahar. NATO units led by troops from Canada, the Netherlands, Britain and the United States are expected to fan out into four southern provinces. Germany will lead NATO forces in the north and Italy in the west.
Rice appeared to ease European concerns over the allegations that the CIA mistreated terrorist suspects in secret prisons and flew detainees around Europe on clandestine flights.
German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said Rice assured them the U.S. administration does not interpret international humanitarian law differently from its allies. His Dutch counterpart Ben Bot told reporters he was "very satisfied" with Rice's explanation.
Bot also said his government had reached an understanding with Afghan authorities guaranteeing that any detainees handed over by Dutch troops there would not face the death penalty or torture.
Rice said the NATO mission will give "special attention to problems of counternarcotics." However, the military rules only say that NATO forces will back up Afghan authorities and won't destroy opium poppy fields or launch military action against heroin producers.
Drug production has boomed since the fall of the Taliban, stoking fears that Afghanistan - source of nearly 90 percent of the world's opium and its derivative heroin - is becoming a narco-state.
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Citation: Paul Ames. "NATO approves plan for Afghan expansion," The Associated Press, 08 December 2005.
Original URL: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/08/AR2005120800404_pf.html
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