March 2013 News 19: US TO SPEED UP TRANSITION PROCESS IN AFGHANISTAN

US TO SPEED UP TRANSITION PROCESS IN AFGHANISTAN

President Barack Obama has promised to speed up a transfer of lead security responsibility from NATO to Afghan forces this spring, in a sign the pace of US troop withdrawal could quicken.

After meeting President Hamid Karzai, Obama said that NATO would have a very limited role in the country after 2014 and insisted that Washington has achieved its prime goal of 'decapitating' al-Qaeda. The leaders met at a crucial moment in final chapter of a long, bloody war and as Obama balances the future security of Afghanistan with US combat fatigue and a desire to spend America's resources at home. "Starting  this spring,  our  troops will have a different mission - training, assisting    Afghan forces. It will be a historic moment and another step towards Afghan sovereignty,” Obama said. NATO plans previously called for foreign forces to transfer the lead in fighting the Taliban by the middle of this year. Obama was careful to stress, however, that US troops will still fight alongside Afghans.

Karzai added that from the spring, "the Afghan forces will be fully responsible for providing security and protection to the Afghan people."

Obama said after 2014, American forces would have a 'very limited' mission is training Afghan forces and preventing a return of al-Qaeda.

But he warned that Karzai, with whom he has had a somewhat testy reel tionship, would have to accept a security agreement,s ' 1 under discussion, granting legal immunity to US troops whp remain behind.

"It will not be possible foes to have any kind of US troop presence post-2014 without assurances that our men and women who are operating there are (not) in some way subject to the jurisdiction of another country."