Kabul welcomes Obama strategy

I / Kabul December 2, 2009, 15:06 IST

The Afghan government today welcomed US President Barack Obama's new strategy ordering an extra 30,000 troops into the war-torn country in a bid to forge a quick end to the war, a spokesman said.

Kabul has long called for the deployment of more than the 1,12,000 NATO and US troops currently in Afghanistan to crush a Taliban insurgency at its deadliest and most widespread since US-led troops ousted their regime in 2001.

President Hamid Karzai has made taking responsibility for the country's security quagmire a major objective of his next five years in office.

His allies have already laid out ambitious plans to boost army and police by up to 400,000 but experts warn that the nation lacks literate young men, veterans with leadership skills, facilities for training and money for weapons.

"The foreign ministry of Afghanistan welcomes the new strategy," spokesman Mohammad Zahir Faqiri told AFP. The US ambassador to Kabul, who was reportedly opposed to a massive build-up of US troops in Afghanistan, vowed today to work energetically to implement President Barack Obama's new strategy.

"I strongly support the decisions President Obama is announcing today to provide clarity and focus to the US mission in Afghanistan," Karl Eikenberry said in a statement released by the embassy in Kabul.

"My team and I will energetically implement this strategy in closest possible partnership" with the Afghan people, government, the NATO-run force in Afghanistan, UN mission and other international partners, he said.