| Germany and the Netherlands are to send a joint military team to north-eastern Afghanistan to improve security and reconstruction, the German defence ministry announced yesterday. The new Provincial Reconstruction Team will be based in Faizabad, an important opium poppy farming region, although the troops will not be involved in drug eradication, Berlin said. Germany already runs a PRT in the northern Kunduz region, and the unspecified number of German troops needed in Faizabad will be drawn from the total of 450 mandated by parliament for PRTs last year. Nato is committed to taking command of five new PRTs by June, including the new German-Dutch initiative. The PRT teams will help run elections due in September. |