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NATO convinced Afghan strategy still works, despite latest setbacks
Published in Saudi Press Agency on 14 - 03 - 2012

The strategy for Afghanistan is still on track,
NATO's ambassador to Kabul insisted on Wednesday, despite admitting
that a recent string of incidents had given it "a bit of a knock," according to dpa.
NATO Senior Civilian Representative Simon Gass - a British career
diplomat - was speaking days after 16 Afghans were allegedly shot
dead by a rogue US soldier, prompting the Afghan parliament to say it
had run out of patience with foreign troops.
"Although events of this sort do cause a bit of a knock, I would
not agree that bonds of trust between Afghanistan and (NATO's mission
there) have been broken," he told reporters in Brussels via videolink
from Kabul.
Sunday's incident followed last month's burning of copies of the
Koran at a US army base - which caused widespread riots - and the
killing of two US officers at the Afghan Ministry of Interior.
Such events "have of course dented confidence in some places and
caused anger and shock among the Afghan people, but these are the
acts of a very, very small number of individuals," Gass said.
Hundreds of thousands of Afghans were working successfully with
foreign troops, he said.
The US-led NATO mission is training the Afghan army and police and
is gradually transferring responsibilities, with a view to a complete
hand-over by the end of 2014.
Such a strategy is "the best way" to ensure that from that date
Afghanistan "will be able to stand as a viable state," albeit with
continuing international support, Gass said.
The size of the foreign military presence needed after 2014 -
thirteen years after the start of a US-led campaign there - will be a
key topic for a NATO summit in Chicago on May 20-21.
Gass dismissed speculation the United States might pull out faster
in the wake of the latest violence. "I am not aware of any new
proposal for drawing down troops," he said, speaking as US Defence
Secretary Leon Panetta was visiting Afghanistan.
To prevent further incidents, vetting procedures to catch Taleban
infiltrators in the Afghan forces had been reinforced, while new
training programmes are being developed to "improve cultural
awareness on both sides," NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said.
"Our soldiers, generally, they want to behave respectfully to
their Afghan hosts, but they very often do not come from backgrounds
which have had any contact at all with the sort of culture which we
have in Afghanistan," NATO's envoy to Kabul noted.
"So we continue to train our troops in some of the key points in
cultural sensitivity... We have to keep on repeating that message as
often as we can. It is very much on the minds of military
commanders," Gass stressed.


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