By IRNA
Berlin : A German Defense Ministry spokesman stressed that no decision has yet been taken on sending a 240-men Quick Reaction Force to Afghanistan to replace a Norwegian unit in July.
“We have to await NATO’s decision whether such a request (for such a force) is made,” Thomas Raabe said in remarks to journalists in Berlin on Wednesday.
“It makes little sense to speculate what the decision will be made,” he added.
Raabe pointed out that the Quick Reaction Force is mandated in the rules of engagement of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).
The German press reported earlier in the day that Berlin was to deploy 250 additional soldiers in northern Afghanistan this summer.
It quoted a lawmaker of the co-ruling Social Democratic Party (SPD) as saying that the new troops will be deployed for combat action unlike other German soldiers who are stationed in Mazar-i Sharif as part of ISAF.
The defense expert of the SPD faction Rainer Arnold added that German combat troops were to differ from other German ISAF soldiers in terms of their equipment, training and combat orders and could also be used for ‘hunting terrorists’.
The German contingent is to replace a 350-men Norwegian rapid reaction force which is to withdraw by July, according to Arnold.
At least 21 German soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since January 2002.
Around 3,500 German soldiers are presently based in northern Afghanistan.
Berlin has faced intense pressure in recent months from its NATO allies, notably the US, Britain and Canada, to expand its military presence into southern Afghanistan where NATO forces are battling a revitalized Taliban insurgency.