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Germany Discusses Extending Afghanistan Mandate
A top German politician has called for sending military troops beyond the Afghan capital of Kabul, when the country hands over leadership of international peacekeeping troops in mid-August. Gernot Erler, foreign affairs expert for the Social Democrat Party (SPD), told the Berliner Zeitung on Tuesday that Germany could "theoretically deploy" as many as 700 troops for peacekeeping missions in provinces outside of Kabul, where security remains a problem. The troops would be those freed up from their duties in the current International Security Assistance Force, or ISAF, when Germany relinquishes its leadership of the troops to NATO. Germany has the largest number of troops in ISAF, with 2,600 soldiers stationed in Kabul. Germany has been called upon by the United States, United Nations, and Afghan President Hamid Karzai to extend its mission beyond the capital. Currently, the only troops operating outside Kabul are those in a U.S.-led coalition force hunting down Taliban and al-Qaeda remnants in the south and east of Afghanistan.Expatica reports: The German government announced Friday that Defence Minister Peter Struck will fly to Kabul this weekend amid mounting indications that Germany will push for an expanded ISAF peacekeeping role in rebuilding Afghanistan. Ostensibly, Struck wants to be in the Afghan capital for the formal handover on Monday of German and Dutch ISAF command to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. But Struck repeatedly in recent days has said that he favours an expanded role for Germany. In Kabul he is expected to confer with a number of officials, including Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai, on an expanded role for the German Bundeswehr beyond Kabul and vicinity. Struck reportedly favours a setting up a German-overseen reconstruction project at Charikar, a town north of Kabul. Once Germans decide to do something they do it methodically. Maybe decisions sometimes take a bit longer because of that.
Posted by: True German Ally 2003-08-08 |
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