Nato agrees to expand training mission in Iraq

1.00pm



BRUSSELS - Nato allies agreed on Wednesday to create a military training academy in Iraq, expanding the alliance's small presence in the country after two years of feuding over the US-led war.

Ambassadors at Nato's headquarters in Brussels reached the accord after overcoming concerns raised by France and others that a larger presence would be tantamount to putting the alliance into the Iraqi battlefield through the back door.

"Today Nato ambassadors agreed on the political directions to the military to enhance Nato assistance to the government of Iraq in the training of its security forces," Nato spokesman James Appathurai told reporters.

"We are very pleased this step has now been taken."

He stressed Nato was there for training and that it would have no direct combat role. The mission will report to Nato but receive help from the US-led Multinational Force to make sure it can go ahead in safety, he said.

Nicholas Burns, US ambassador to Nato, said the accord, which is expected to raise the Nato presence to around 300 from just 40 now, was a "significant step by the alliance".

"The US is proud to undertake with its allies the expansion of the mission in Iraq," he said in a statement. He said Washington was ready to offer "considerable financial and other resources" to ensure the operation was a success.

No start date for the military academy was given but Nato Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer has pledged to launch training as soon as possible to help Iraqi security forces deal with the bloody insurgency there.

In the latest in a wave of car bomb attacks in Baghdad, a suicide bomber blew up his vehicle in a crowded commercial street as dozens of men hoping to join the country's security forces queued up to photocopy their documents. Officials at Baghdad's Yarmuk hospital said 11 people had been killed.

The Nato academy will focus on offering training to medium- and senior-ranking Iraqi officers to help them fight the wave of violence across the country and ensure that elections scheduled for January can go ahead as planned.

Appathurai said the accord also called on Nato to identify where it could offer training services outside Iraq and to provide unspecified "technical assistance" to Iraqi authorities.

France, Germany and other opponents of the US-led war have said they will have no presence in Iraq itself, but some have shown interest in offering training outside the country.

The 26-nation Nato agreed to get involved in July only after a squabble about whether it should have a role in Iraq at all, with those countries who opposed the war anxious that any presence not be seen as justifying the initial conflict.

The final accord was stalled for weeks as Nato envoys dealt with a number of disputed points, notably what the academy's relationship would be to the US-led coalition.

The agreement calls for the mission to report to Maj Gen David Petraeus, the US officer in command of existing training in the country, under a so-called "double-hatting" arrangement.

Under such an arrangement, Petraeus will be in both the command line of Nato and that of the Multinational Force.

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq