NATO mulls paying for Afghan forces after 2014
04 February, 2012
BRUSSELS: NATO's top official said on Friday that the alliance expects regional powers to contribute to a multibillion dollar fund to finance the Afghan army and police after they assume full responsibility for the war in 2014. Since Afghanistan cannot foot the estimated $6 billion annual bill, NATO nations will have to pay the bulk of it. But austerity measures and budgetary cuts caused by the financial crisis in the United States and Europe are making it difficult to raise the money within the alliance. NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said he was appealing to the entire international community to help finance the force. Asked whether he was specifically referring to China, India and Russia, he said, "It's a call on the whole of the international community to contribute to financing the Afghan security forces because I think it is also in the interest of countries in the region to see a stable and secure Afghanistan." Meanwhile, NATO military commanders will beef up security measures to prevent insurgents from infiltrating the Afghan army after French troops were killed by a renegade soldier, the alliance chief said on Friday. NATO defence ministers endorsed a French proposal to task military authorities with devising new plans before the end of the month as they wrapped up two days of talks focused on the decade-old war in Afghanistan. "We have already taken a lot of steps," Rasmussen told a news conference. "But in light of recent events, we agreed to strengthen those efforts." Some 130,000 NATO troops work with more than 300,000 members of the Afghan security forces. "There is a realisation about the need to better control the recruitment to prevent infiltrations in the army," French Defence Minister Gerard Longuet told reporters. "These events are rare, but they are symbolically important for the credibility of the Afghan army," he said. "Quantitatively, they are marginal. Media-wise, they are unbearable." End.
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