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Nato's Afghan strategy 'working' US warning on Nato's Afghan role
(about 5 hours later)
A senior British diplomat has defended Nato's operation in Afghanistan, saying the overall strategy is working and the alliance is there for the long haul. The European public needs convincing that Nato's mission in Afghanistan is part of a wider fight against global terror, the US defence secretary says.
But Stewart Eldon, the UK's permanent representative to Nato, says there are some problems on the ground. Robert Gates warned that the future of Nato was at risk if it became a "two-tiered alliance" of countries which fought, and those that did not.
In an interview for the BBC's The World This Weekend, he says co-ordination must be improved and more members of the alliance must play a bigger role. Mr Gates was speaking on the last day of a security conference in Munich.
Mr Eldon adds it was a "mistake" to say Afghanistan would make or break Nato. The summit is also set to consider a threatened diplomatic crisis with Russia over Kosovan independence plans.
A key challenge, he also says, is to overcome a history in which different countries have focused on different regions of Afghanistan, in order to ensure a more harmonious approach across the country. 'Threat to alliance'
Mr Eldon also says it is important to make sure the overall international effort was better co-ordinated. Mr Gates said it was incumbent upon Nato leaders to "recapitulate to the people of Europe the importance of the Afghanistan mission and its relationship to the wider terrorist threat".
He denies Nato strategy was failing, but says there is a need to see more requirements being filled, and more equitable burden-sharing within the alliance. "On a conceptual level, I believe it falls squarely within the traditional bounds of the alliance's core purpose: to defend the security interests and values of the trans-Atlantic community," he told the gathering of the world's top defence officials.
The World This Weekend is broadcast on Radio 4 at 1300 GMT on Sunday. "We must not - we cannot - become a two-tiered alliance of those who are willing to fight and those who are not," he added.
"Such a development, with all its implications for collective security, would effectively destroy the alliance."
Earlier - in an interview with the BBC - a senior British diplomat defended Nato's operation in Afghanistan, saying the overall strategy was working despite some problems on the ground.
Stewart Eldon, the UK's permanent representative to Nato, said it was a "mistake" to say Afghanistan would make or break Nato.
'State of emergency'
The BBC's Jonathan Marcus, at the conference, says the issue of Kosovo was also likely to make waves on the final day of the talks.
Russia's first deputy prime minister Sergei Ivanov was addressing delegates on Sunday.
Ahead of his speech, a Russian spokesman told the BBC that a declaration of independence by Kosovo and its subsequent recognition by the United States and many European Union countries would create an international state of emergency.
That, the spokesman said, could jeopardise the whole standing of the United Nations.