[R-G] Netherlands extends Afghan mission to 2010

[Anthony Fenton]

Netherlands extends Afghan mission to 2010

http://www.thestar.com/News/article/281584

Role in Uruzgan will continue, but number of troops will shrink
Dec 01, 2007 04:30 AM
Gerald de Hemptinne
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE

THE HAGUE– Dutch troops will stay in Afghanistan with the  
multinational NATO-led International Security Assistance Force for  
another two years until 2010, the government said yesterday.

The centre-left coalition government said it would extend the mandate  
of the Dutch troops in the southern Afghan province of Uruzgan until  
December 2010. The mandate had been set to expire in August 2008.

The government decision still has to be approved by parliament but it  
is expected to go through because the parties in the coalition  
government, who hold a majority of the 150 seats, are backing the  
extension.

"Today the Dutch cabinet decided that we will make a new contribution  
to the ISAF mission in Uruzgan for a period of two years," Prime  
Minister Jan Peter Balkenende told reporters.

"The Netherlands will end its leading role in Uruzgan on Aug. 1,  
2010," Balkenende said. Troops would pull out over a four-month  
period and would be home before December 2010.

A government statement said the mission would, however, be slimmed  
down as NATO partners Czech Republic, France, Hungary and Slovakia  
had agreed to contribute troops.

Currently the Dutch have some 1,650 soldiers in Uruzgan: that number  
will be brought to between 1,450 and 1,350, said the statement.

Balkenende said he wanted the parliament to vote on the matter before  
the Christmas recess that starts Dec. 21.

"The government realizes that the new mission will ask a lot of the  
Dutch armed forces," the cabinet said in a letter sent to parliament  
yesterday.

"Although it remains a complex and risky mission with a likelihood of  
Dutch victims, the government believes the importance of the mission  
outweighs the risks," it added.

Most of the Dutch troops are in southern Uruzgan, where they have  
faced heavy fighting with insurgents from the extremist Taliban  
movement that ran Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001.

Twelve Dutch soldiers have been killed since deploying last year as  
part of the ISAF mission.

NATO has been trying to persuade its partners in ISAF to recommit to  
the tough mission in Afghanistan and to meet a shortfall of soldiers  
and equipment.

Canada currently has about 2,600 troops in Afghanistan, most of them  
in the Kandahar region in the south. The military mission is slated  
to end in February 2009 but the Conservative government wants it  
extended to 2011.