Afghanistan: Security transition speeds up

KABUL -- The Afghan police and army will soon take responsibility for safeguarding another 17 areas of the country, officials said yesterday, accelerating a process meant to pave the way for ending the Western combat mission by 2014.

The zones scheduled for "transition," as the process is known, are mainly in areas of the country where combat has been less fierce in recent months, such as the north and west. But they do include several hot spots, such as Helmand province in the south, whose capital, Lashkar Gah, was handed over to Afghan forces over the summer.

The list of areas, to be formally unveiled next week by Afghan President Hamid Karzai at an international conference in Turkey, was still being finalized. However, changes between now and then were expected to be minor.

Northern provinces on the list include Balkh, whose capital, Mazar-e-Sharif, was handed over in July, together with Takhar and Badakshan. While the north has seen relatively low levels of fighting in the 10-year war, insurgents have been consolidating their presence there.

Afghanistan's east, the part of the country that lies closest to Pakistan's tribal areas, emerged as a major battlefront during the warm-weather "fighting season" that is now drawing to a close. All or part of several eastern provinces, though, are designated for handover.

The new batch of handovers will affect half of Afghanistan's 34 provinces, officials said after a planning meeting in Kabul. The process is expected to stretch over the next 18 months.

Reviews have been mixed in some of the areas where Afghan security forces assumed control over the summer. Some previously peaceful transition zones were swiftly hit with a wave of attacks, and some provincial officials complained that their police forces were not large or well-equipped enough to take on the responsibility. But Western officials insist the process has been largely successful.