Hague, February 10: NATO Secretary General Rasmussen officially asked the Dutch government to stay in Afghanistan after its planned pull out in August.
NATO asked the Netherlands to stay in Afghanistan with a smaller presence attached to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), which would focus on the training of Afghan troops and transferring responsibilities to the Afghan authorities.
“The government will review the possibility and the desirability,” said Dutch foreign minister Maxime Verhagen. “We’ll also look at how the excellent results of the Netherlands in Uruzgan may be perpetuated.”
–IANS–