LONDON: Tony Blair summoned fellow European leaders to London on Sunday night for an unprecedented council of war, fuelling speculation that the allies were planning a ground offensive in Afghanistan.

Over dinner in Downing Street, the prime minister told the leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Belgium that the war was “making steady progress” after the destruction of the Taliban’s aerial defences.

“We are now into a second phase hitting the Taliban’s front lines,” Blair’s official spokesman said. His remarks indicate that Downing Street believes the war is moving through a series of phases which are likely to lead to the deployment of ground troops in the near future. The spokesman refused to be drawn on the use of ground troops, but the Conservative leader, Iain Duncan Smith, said “ultimately” they would have to be deployed to remove the Taliban and Osama bin Laden.

Downing Street is hoping Sunday’s dinner will go some way to putting the prime minister’s diplomatic offensive back on track after his mixed reception last week in the Middle East and the growing anxiety at the numbers of civilian casualties in Afghanistan.

The British government underlined its unease over allegations that the Americans were carpet-bombing Afghanistan by releasing figures showing that a “minuscule” proportion of the country had been targeted.

John Reid, the Northern Ireland secretary, told BBC-TV’s Breakfast with Frost: “I hear reports about carpet bombing as if the whole of Afghanistan is being targeted. It isn’t. The land mass which is actually affected by bombings in Afghanistan is 0.0002536 per cent. It is minuscule.”

His remarks were designed to counter the growing opposition to the war, particularly within the Labour party. This view was articulated on Sunday by two Labour Muslim peers — Lord Ahmed and Lady Uddin — who warned of deep unhappiness among Muslims at the continued bombing.

Officials went out of their way to trumpet Sunday’s dinner which was attended by the French President, Jacques Chirac; his prime minister, Lionel Jospin; the German chancellor, Gerhard Schroder; the Italian prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi; the Spanish prime minister, Jose Maria Aznar; and the Belgian prime minister and current EU president, Guy Verhofstadt. Javier Solana, the EU’s foreign policy chief, also attended.

Blair’s official spokesman said the dinner, which comprised the leaders of the five EU countries who have offered military assistance plus the Belgian prime minister, was important in upholding a “common Europe position”. —Dawn/The Guardian News Service.