Rumsfeld urges larger NATO role in Afghanistan

By Liz Sly
Chicago Tribune

	AIJAZ RAHI / AP Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, right, and Afghan President Hamid Karzai, left, leave the Presidential Palace yesterday after a joint news conference in Kabul, Afghanistan.
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Hours after Rumsfeld left, a rocket exploded near the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, underscoring the growing threat to the effort to stabilize the country in the face of extremists linked to the former Taliban regime.

The rocket landed in a field about 400 yards from the embassy, causing no casualties or damage, according to an embassy spokesman. Police officials blamed the Taliban.

Rumsfeld's brief visit coincided with growing concerns at rising violence against aid workers and government officials, as well as U.S. troops still hunting remnants of al-Qaida.

In the latest attack, an Afghan government worker was killed and 10 others were injured yesterday when the convoy in which they were traveling in the southern province of Farah came under attack from rocket-propelled grenades. The workers were carrying out a census project on behalf of the United Nations as a prelude to registering voters for elections scheduled for next year.

The United Nations' international staff members in Afghanistan had suspended most of their operations in 13 of the most volatile provinces in the south and east after the shooting death three weeks ago of a Frenchwoman working for the U.N. refugee agency in Ghazni.

The attacks have called into question the feasibility of holding the elections in June, given increasing dangers for foreigners and Afghans working for the government.

Rumsfeld, who was in Afghanistan to explore ways of bolstering security before the elections, said he was confident the vote would go ahead. "I can't imagine that there will be any type of delay," he said. Rumsfeld said his meetings explored the possibility of expanding NATO's mandate to include some of the actions handled by the 11,500-member U.S.-led coalition force, which is engaged mainly in the hunt for al-Qaida remnants.

"There's no definition of that; there's no timetable. It is simply a thought that's under discussion," he said after meeting with Afghan President Hamid Karzai in Kabul.

The suggestion that NATO might relieve the coalition of some of its Afghanistan duties was raised this week at NATO headquarters in Brussels and is seen as a possible exit strategy for the 8,500 U.S. troops in the country.

If NATO did take over the coalition effort in Afghanistan, it wouldn't mean that U.S. troops would leave, Rumsfeld said.

"No matter what the role NATO might take ... we're a part of NATO, we would be involved in that role," he said.

There is a growing consensus that NATO, which took control of the 5,700-strong International Security Assistance Force in Kabul in August, needs to expand its presence outside the capital if the slide toward anarchy, especially in the south and east, is to be halted.

Another concern is the continued factional fighting in the northern provinces between rival warlords nominally allied to Karzai's government. On a brief stopover in the northern city of Mazar-e-Sharif, Rumsfeld met with the two biggest warlords, Gen. Rashid Dostum and his chief rival, Atta Mohammad, to try to persuade them to cooperate with a regional disarmament program.

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