Telegraph

Turkey agrees to lead an international alliance-building ground force By Anton La Guardia in Ankara (Filed: 19/10/2001)

A TURKISH-LED force is to be deployed in northern Afghanistan to help anti-Taliban forces gain territory and begin rebuilding the country, under plans being drawn up by Western countries and the United Nations.

As London and Washington lose hope that the air campaign will cause a spontaneous "implosion" of the Taliban, they are being forced to prepare for a complex game involving ground action and alliance-building by anti-Taliban groups.

Jack Straw, Foreign Secretary, held talks yesterday with Turkish leaders to discuss an international force that would deploy as soon as possible in territory controlled by the anti-Taliban Northern Alliance.

The strategy has echoes of the tactics used in Sierra Leone, where Britain helped government forces recapture territory from rebel forces while United Nations peacekeepers helped to consolidate areas behind the frontline.

Mr Straw also gave Turkish officials assurances that the war would not be extended beyond Afghanistan, especially to Iraq.

British officials ruled out large-scale ground operations by Western forces in Afghanistan, accepting "good advice" from Turkish leaders in Ankara yesterday that they would be seen as a foreign invasion.

Instead, the two sides agreed that most of the fighting would be done by the Northern Alliance. "Foreign special forces can play a specific role, but there is no substitute for infantry taking territory. Most of the men with guns on the ground will be Afghans," said a senior British source.

"External military action can change the balance of advantage on the ground, but the change of government is in the hands of the Afghans."

Turkey has told Britain it is worried that a protracted air campaign will destabilise parts of the Muslim world, especially Pakistan, and wants to see more ground action.

Ertugrul Ciragan, diplomatic adviser to Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit, said: "The Prime Minister said [to Mr Straw] that ground forces must intervene quickly. How long can you go on bombing?"

Turkey supported Afghanistan - training the army, building schools and creating its bureaucracy - for about half a century until the overthrow of the monarchy in 1973.

The faction led by Gen Abdel-Rashid Dostoum, who is financed and armed by Turkey, has in recent days stepped up attacks to capture the strategic northern town of Mazar-i-Sharif.

Turkish and British leaders discussed plans to bolster the anti-Taliban forces by deploying international forces, probably led by Turkey under United Nations mandate, to bring stability and reconstruction.

As territory is gained and the Northern Alliance gains new allies, the United Nations would gradually build up a broad-based multi-ethnic government.

Ismail Cem, Turkey's foreign minister, said Ankara was ready to send peacekeeping forces but shied away "for the moment" from offering fighting troops.

"I think political change is needed [in Afghanistan]. I think that we might work for a gradual rather than abrupt change," he said.

"If certain regions of Afghanistan have peace, then in those regions we might have a function of peacekeeping."

-- Anonymous, October 18, 2001