NATO Looks Toward Afghan Handover

[unhappycamper]

NATO Looks Toward Afghan Handover
April 23, 2010
Associated Press

TALLINN, Estonia - NATO agreed to begin handing over command of the war in Afghanistan to the troubled Afghan government this year, a process that if successful would enable President Barack Obama to start bringing U.S. troops home by his target date of July 2011.

But the accord reached Friday appeared short on details and timelines, and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton warned of a rocky road ahead in a country beset with a resilient insurgency, limited resources and a weak, sometimes dysfunctional central government.

Clinton said she was pleased with progress toward eliminating the shortage of allied trainers for the Afghan army and police. She offered a generally sunny outlook for Afghanistan and said the government of much-criticized President Hamid Karzai gets too little credit for progress in building a viable democracy.

"We believe that with sufficient attention, training and mentoring, the Afghans themselves are perfectly capable of defending themselves against insurgents," she told a news conference. "Does that mean it will be smooth sailing? I don't think so. Look at Iraq."

NATO is still about 450 short of its target for a training force to assist the Afghan security forces, and while that gap apparently was not filled during Friday's session, Clinton said she was not discouraged.