Nato’s Afghan troops presence may extend

KABUL, Wednesday

Foreign soldiers could still be fighting in Afghanistan well beyond the 2014 date for a full handover of powers to local forces, NATO’s civilian representative in the country said on Wednesday.

Mr Mark Sedwill said 2014 was a “goal” not a deadline for the transition of responsibility to Afghan authorities but that the exact number of places where local forces will be in charge of security would become clear nearer the time.

The date was “realistic but not guaranteed”, Mr Sedwill said.

“We expect to have strategic overwatch around large parts of the country by then (2014) but the Afghans having the lead does not mean that we have completed the process in every single district by then,” he told reporters.

“That’s why we have been very careful about choosing the language: that they have the lead but it’s not that we’re done by the end of 2014.”

Mr Sedwill was speaking before Nato leaders gather on Friday for a two-day summit likely to be dominated by the alliance’s continued involvement in Afghanistan.

The meeting would likely see the 28-member bloc back a plan for the full transfer of powers to the Afghan government in four years’ time, he said.

An assessment about which areas of the war-torn country could start the process in the next six months to two years had been submitted but would not be made public until the Afghan government disclosed it, he added.

“We will start with several provinces” in the “first half of 2011”, he told reporters in Kabul. “In some cases it will be the whole province... in other cases it will start at district or below district, municipality or town level’’. (AFP)