BERLIN, 14 September 2005 — NATO defense ministers sought yesterday to play down differences over how to expand the alliance’s role in Afghanistan, days before key elections in the violence-scarred country. US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld was notably expected to press his allies over the future role of the International Security Assistance Force, which NATO has led since 2003.
A NATO spokesman admitted that strains remain, notably over plans for closer cooperation between ISAF’s peacekeeping mission and the US-led Operation Enduring Freedom, which tackles more frontline combat operations. “All nations agree that ISAF and OEF need to work more closely together, and that when NATO takes over operations throughout the country that there must be unity of command,” said NATO spokesman James Appathurai.
But he said: “Within that is where the details need to be worked out,” adding: “Different countries have different visions.” NATO has beefed up its troop levels in the run-up to Afghanistan’s first parliamentary elections in three decades next weekend, which has seen a surge in violence across the country.
In Berlin, the NATO ministers will specifically discuss the planned extension of ISAF into the south of the country early next year, in the latest stage of its expansion around the country after starting in the capital Kabul. While all NATO states back the continued expansion of ISAF, the US push for more synergy with the US-led mission faces reservations from some Europeans — notably Germany which will not let its troops be drawn into frontline combat. German Defense Minister Peter Struck, hosting the Berlin talks, stressed his country’s opposition to a merger the two missions yesterday. “I don’t want our soldiers to face further dangers if these two mandates are linked to each other,” he told RBB radio in Berlin.
Rumsfeld, speaking before arriving in Berlin for the two-day talks, underlined that at some point Washington expects NATO to take over capabilities across the country, including the more violence-wracked east. And he also said the US wants NATO to develop new roles as well as straight peacekeeping. “It would be nice if NATO developed counter terrorism capabilities ... which don’t exist at the present time as a NATO function,” he said.
British Defense Secretary John Reid called for thousands of extra NATO troops to be sent to Afghanistan as the alliance expands into less stable parts of the country. Reid said southern Afghanistan will be more hazardous. “The Taleban are still active in the area... We must be prepared to support, even defend, the provincial reconstruction team,” he said in a speech before flying to Berlin.” Meanwhile, Afghan President Hamid Karzai urged the US and other world leaders to reconsider the strategy for fighting terrorism in the war-torn country, saying thee should be a focus on the “sources of terrorism.”
“We and the international community, the coalition, must sit down and reconsider and re-think whether the approach to the threat of terrorism that has (been) taken is the absolutely right one,” he told the BBC.
Karzai also urged voters to support honest candidates in the landmark legislative elections this weekend amid concerns that warlords and others with violent backgrounds are on the ballots. Speaking to tribal elders and government officials in the western city of Herat, Karzai also called on the international community not to turn its back on his war-shattered nation after the polls, saying more foreign aid was needed.
UN-backed election observers on Monday struck 21 candidates off the ballot for suspected links to armed groups. In Kabul yesterday, about 100 people protested the disqualification of one of those candidates. Dozens of armed police watched the peaceful demonstration outside the UN headquarters, but did not intervene. Despite the disqualifications, human rights groups claim that several other regional strongmen with ties to militias remain on the ballot, raising fears that this weekend’s key step toward democracy might be undermined by the very men it is trying to marginalize.
