The weekly debate organized by BBC and HotNews.Ro had as guest this weekend Mihai Carp, deputy chief in the Crisis Management Department on the NATO HQ Operations Division. "We expect not only Romania, but all its allies to provide more troops", said Mihai Carp about the current situation in Afghanistan, mentioning that its is probable for Romania and several other states to officially announce a further boost of their troops in Afghanistan during the NATO summit in Bucharest next week.
Romania President Traian Basescu already announced on Thursday that Romania will send 280 new soldiers to Afghanistan, adding up to a total of 780, but the NATO official says that a further deployment may be discussed. Columnist Christian Mititelu believes that it is in Romania's best interest to be part of the group that first announces sending more troops to Afghanistan.
Mihai Carp added that the signals are quite good when it comes to Romania supplementing its troops within NATO, but that he has no knowledge about the signals in the American coalition.
* Mihai Carp: There is a commitment Romania made within the NATO forces in Afghanistan and there is a Romanian commitment for the American coalition in Afghanistan. Still, we do not have to make a too big difference between the two missions, since the international military presence in Afghanistan as a whole has the same purpose. So, if Romania decides to send more troops for the American coalition, this is something to be mentioned in a bilateral conversation. Regarding NATO, we are interested in the NATO mission under ISAF leadership (ISAF = International Security Assistance Force). For NATO, I heard the signals were good, but I don't have information about the American coalition.
The deputy chief in the Crisis Management Department does not know who many more soldier will be sent to
