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NATO Ministers To Discuss Afghan Withdrawal

April 18, 2012

by RFE/RL's Radio Free Afghanistan

NATO ministers have gathered in Brussels for two days of talks that are expected to focus on the planned military withdrawal from Afghanistan.

The majority of the 130,000-strong NATO-led force is scheduled to leave Afghanistan by 2014, when full responsibility for security will be handed over to Afghan security forces.

Foreign and defense ministers from NATO's 28 member countries are expected to discuss exactly how many NATO troops will stay behind after 2014, along with the issue of how much participants will pay to help sustain Afghan forces over the long term.

Speaking in Brussels on April 18 on the first day of the meeting, NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen reiterated the alliance's commitment to Afghanistan beyond 2014, saying it will continue to train and provide funding to Afghan forces.

"My message to the enemies of Afghanistan is very clear," he said. "You cannot just wait us out. As we gradually draw down, a still stronger Afghan security force is taking charge to protect the Afghan people against brutality and inhumanity."

The United States is expected to ask its international partners to provide up to a quarter of the $4 billion a year it expects it will cost to continue backing Afghan forces.

Deadly Attacks

As part of its exit strategy, NATO is also planning to train some 350,000 Afghan soldiers and policemen by the end of this year as it works to fill the void that will be created by the withdrawal of international troops.

That number is expected to be sustained through to 2015, after which a gradual drawdown to some 230,000 troops is expected by 2017.

A final commitment on funding Afghan security is expected to be announced at a NATO summit in Chicago next month (May 20-21).

On April 18, Defense Ministry spokesman General Mohammad Zahir Azimi said that the Afghan National Army had already reached its target number of 195,000 troops.

The meeting in Brussels comes after a wave of coordinated deadly militant attacks in Kabul and three other cities on April 15, which left 35 insurgents, 11 members of the Afghan security forces, and four civilians dead.

Rasmussen confirmed the attacks helped highlight the challenges that lie ahead, but was also keen to stress that the attacks showed the strength of the Afghan security forces, which dealt with the situation and defeated the militants, largely on their own.

"We have seen some spectacular attacks and those coordinated attacks may very well get the headlines in the media but the fact is that the enemies of Afghanistan don't get a foothold on the ground in Afghanistan," he said. "We saw Afghan security forces deal very skillfully and in a very professional manner with that security challenge."

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is to attend the two-day meeting on April 19 to discuss NATO's missile-defense system in Europe, a move that Moscow firmly opposes.

With reporting by dpa, AFP, and AP

Source: http://www.rferl.org/content/nato_discusses_afghan_withdrawal/24551921.html

Copyright (c) 2012. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.