BRATISLAVA, June 24, (WEBNOVINY) — Slovak soldiers in the ISAF mission will operate in Afghanistan until 2014, which is the deadline agreed-upon by NATO leaders as the year when combat operations would end. “ Armed Forces of the Slovak Republic will operate in Afghanistan until the process ends of transferring the responsibility to Afghan authorities in 2014, while the present contribution will gradually transform and the main focus will be on training Afghan security forces,“ confirmed spokesman for the Ministry of Defense Ivan Rudolf for SITA news agency.
U.S. President Barack Obama this week confirmed he plans to withdraw 33,000 U.S. troops from Afghanistan by the end of September 2012. French President Nicolas Sarkozy followed with a similar plan. He said that French soldiers would start returning from Afghanistan in a similar timeframe as U.S. soldiers. „The Ministry of Defense acknowledges the statement by the U.S. president on the planned drawdown of U.S. troops in Afghanistan, which is consistent with his previous statements. A temporary surge of U.S. troops in Afghanistan by more than 30,000 in 2009 and 2010 greatly helped improving the security situation in the country and helped begin the process of transferring the responsibility to the hands of the Afghan government,“ said Rudolf. The Slovak Republic has an approved mandate for 348 soldiers in the ISAF mission in Afghanistan. At this point, actually deployed are 323 soldiers.
SITA