"Both sides are studying a memorandum of understanding now. I am optimistic we will reach an agreement in the next three days," the spokesman, Aimal Faizi, told Reuters. US embassy officials were not immediately available for comment.

The Strategic Partnership Agreement, which Washington and Kabul have been discussing for over a year, will be the framework for US involvement in Afghanistan beyond 2014, when the last foreign combat troops are due to leave Afghanistan.

Afghanistan wants the United States and NATO to agree to stop carrying out night raids on Afghan homes as a precondition for signing an agreement with Washington and a timeline to assume control over detention centers.

In a meeting on Monday between Afghan President Hamid Karzai, US ambassador Ryan Crocker and Gen. John Allen, the NATO commander in Afghanistan, the American side proposed a six-month timeline for the transfer.

Karzai was reported to have set a deadline of March 9 for the United States to hand over the detention facilities.

An Afghan official said that under one possible scenario, a transfer of prisons could start within the next few days and it may be completed within six months.

"There are improvements," Karzai told reporters yesterday of negotiations on a partnership.

The Obama administration has been hoping it can conclude an agreement before a meeting of NATO leaders in Chicago in May.

While the document would not nail down details, it is expected to contain an agreement in principle to some sort of US military presence in Afghanistan beyond the end of 2014, when most NATO combat troops are expected to be gone.

A failure to broker a deal might strain US-Afghan relations, and increase the chances of prolonged instability in Afghanistan.

The latest round of talks have been complicated by tensions over the burning of copies of the Muslim holy book at a NATO base, which triggered violent protests and prompted some Afghan security forces to turn their weapons on American soldiers.

While the rules covering night raids and air strikes have been tightened, they continue to cause great resentment among many Afghans. Movement on the detention issue had also stalled, causing a deadlock.

Faizi said once a deal was reached on the transfer of detention centers, both sides would attempt to draw up a memorandum of understanding on the night raids.


An avalanche has buried a village in northeastern Afghanistan, killing at least 37 people and leaving dozens more still trapped under the snow, officials said Tuesday.

The avalanche slammed into the village in Shekay district of mountainous Badakhshan province late Monday after days of heavy snowfall were followed by a rise in temperature, said provincial spokesman Abdul Rauf Rasekh.

Afghanistan's harshest winter in 15 years has already claimed scores of lives, with the latest avalanche taking the total death toll to at least 80 in Badakhshan alone, he said.

"Thirty-seven bodies, including women and children, have been recovered from under the snow so far," Rasekh said, adding that search and rescue teams were desperately digging for survivors.

But it was feared that the death toll would rise sharply as dozens of villagers remain trapped under the snow, he said. Six injured people had been evacuated to neighboring Tajikistan for emergency treatment.

Heavy snowfalls and avalanches kill scores of people in Afghanistan each winter, but the death toll has been higher than usual this year.

Thirty-five children died over two days in remote districts of Badakshan in late February after roads to districts were blocked by heavy snow, officials said.

And in Kabul, 24 children died in refugee camps on the outskirts of the capital, which houses thousands of Afghans fleeing war and Taleban intimidation in southern Afghanistan, according to officials.