Croatia is considering pulling out its troops from NATO's mission in Afghanistan, Jutarnji List daily reported on Friday, citing Defence Ministry sources, after a two-day meeting of NATO defence ministers in Brussels on February 12-13.
According to unnamed ministry sources cited by Jutarnji List, a meeting of ministers from countries taking part in NATO’s mission Resolute Support in Afghanistan discussed the future of the mission, in light of peace negotiations led by the Afghan government and the Taliban.
The meeting ended with an agreement that all countries with troops on the ground would “inevitably move towards reducing their presence” in Afghanistan.
In order to allow gradual reduction in forces on the ground, the mission slogan was also replaced, from “All together in, all together out,” – which suggested that all allied troops would pull out at the same time – to “All together in, all together adjust,” i.e. each country is allowed to decide on its level of participation in the mission, as long as its decision is coordinated with other allies.
Croatia has 104 soldiers in Aghanistan, who are mainly deployed in military advisor roles for the Afghan army, police, and special forces. The change in doctrine now clears the way for Croatia to pull out of the mission if it wants to, provided that the move is discussed first with the United States and Germany, as Croatians are attached to units from those two countries stationed in the cities of Kabul and Mazar-i-Sharif.
President-elect Zoran Milanovic, who is yet to formally take office in an official ceremony next week, had called for pulling out of Aghanistan during his election campaign, saying that it had become pointless. However, there have been to official talks on this yet, Jutarnji List reported.
In exchange for the potential departure from Aghanistan, Croatia might offer more troops for the NATO mission in Kosovo, defence ministry sources said. Croatia has some 30 soldiers in Kosovo as part of KFOR, tasked with air transport and other auxiliary roles.
In Iraq, Croatia has seven military instructors based in Baghdad where they train Iraqi security forces. Although they had been evacuated to Kuwait last month in the aftermath of an American airstrike which killed top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, it was confirmed on Thursday that they would now return to Iraq.
