NATO will expand its peacekeeping operation in Afghanistan, sending more troops to western regions.

The deployment, announced after NATO defence ministers met in Nice Thursday, will only increase the current mission of 8,400 by 500 new troops, while another 400 will be moved from other parts of the country.

Nonetheless, NATO's leader applauded the decision to send 900 NATO troops to Herat and three other western Afghan cities, because it ended months of foot-dragging by Italy, Spain and Lithuania.




"We have the resources. We need to expand," NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told a news conference.

"The extended International Security Assistance Force mission will provide security assistance in 50 per cent of Afghanistan's territory."

The new troops will help NATO meet its plan to extend its activities across the country by early 2006, integrating its troops with the 16,000-member U.S. force still fighting Taliban and al-Qaeda militants.




The defence ministers also decided to send a few hundred more troops to NATO's mission in Iraq, where they are training Iraqi security officers.

The United States, which had long pushed for more NATO involvement in both countries, applauded the decision.

"The breadth of involvement on the part of NATO countries in these kinds of activities puts a lot of countries with a stake in the success of those activities, and that's a good thing," said U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

NATO's force in Afghanistan currently includes troops from more than 30 countries, including Canada, but they have until now been deployed in Kabul and northern regions.

Thursday also marked the start of a new six-month tour of duty in Kabul for about 700 Canadian troops.

This is the fourth deployment of Canadian soldiers to Afghanistan since August 2003.

Defence Minister Bill Graham says Canada is committed to making the Kabul area safe and secure as Afghanistan rebuilds under democratic rule.

Most of the soldiers on the mission come from CFB Petawawa in Ontario, but the contingent includes personnel from across Canada.