Britain to NATO members: help more in Afghanistan

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(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-11-12 08:57

LONDON -- British and US officials urged other NATO members Tuesday to send more troops to Afghanistan, saying the alliance's success there required a more equal sharing of the war burden.

Afghan men look at a vehicle which was damaged in a gunfight in Khoni Khowar in Khost province November 10, 2008. The governor of the eastern province of Khost said an air strike killed 14 Afghan security guards working for a road construction project. [Agencies]

For months NATO has called for boosting its 50,000-troop mission to quell rising violence in Afghanistan, and has grown frustrated with the reluctance of some European members to either increase their contribution or deploy to more dangerous regions.

"Of course we are ready to consider what is necessary, but it must be part of a burden-sharing exercise where different countries play their part," British Prime Minister Gordon Brown told reporters.

NATO's force in Afghanistan includes about 20,000 troops from the United States and 8,000 from Britain, the two highest contributors. US President-elect Barack Obama has said he plans to add about 7,000 or 8,000 troops to the NATO mission.

In addition, there are some 12,000 US troops in the country operating outside NATO's command.

Germany in September approved an increase of 1,000 troops for Afghanistan, for a maximum of 4,500 German troops in the country. However, politicians have kept German soldiers from deploying to Afghanistan's volatile southern reaches, where mainly US forces are locked in a tough fight against al-Qaida and Taliban militants.

Canada, Italy and France each contribute around 2,500 troops to the NATO mission, and the Netherlands 1,700. Australia and Poland each sent around 1,000, and dozens of other nations provide smaller numbers.

On Monday, after two Spanish troops were killed in a weekend suicide attack in western Afghanistan, Spain's Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said his country had no plans to withdraw its 800-troop deployment but also would not increase it.

Britain's defense secretary, John Hutton, reiterated Brown's call on Tuesday for other alliance members to step up and suggested more UK troops were unlikely.

"No one can say that we are not pulling our weight in the international coalition. We expect others to as well," Hutton said in a keynote speech to the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London.

Meanwhile in Berlin, the visiting US ambassador to NATO also said that winning the Afghan war would require a revamped military strategy and a commitment from NATO members to more equally share the burden.

"When you look at what all of the NATO allies are doing, it's not enough for the challenge that's there," the US ambassador, Kurt Volker, said.

NATO has also said it needs more instructors to train the Afghan army that is expected to grow to 134,000 by 2014.

Hutton said more work was also needed to secure Afghanistan's border with Pakistan.