ISLAMABAD, Nov 29: Nato has asked Pakistan whether it would like the western alliance’s 1,000-strong contingent to continue earthquake relief here beyond the present 90-day mandate, a senior alliance official said on Tuesday.

Maurits Jochems, deputy assistant secretary-general for planning in Nato’s operations division, told a news briefing here that he did not receive an immediate reply when he raised the matter in a meeting with a foreign ministry official.

Fielding questions together with the Nato contingent commander Air Commodore Andrew Walton, Mr Jochems said there had been no Pakistani request yet for a longer stay of Nato’s engineering-cum-medical team but he had still raised the issue because the group needed a four-week advance notice to prepare to leave.

Mr Jochems said although the present agreement between Pakistan and Nato had limited the contingent’s stay to only “90 days”, the period could be extended “only with mutual consent”.

He said he had told Pakistani officials to “tell us in advance...if you think we could be useful for another period of time”. “I don’t say another 90 days but perhaps (for) a few more weeks here and there.”

The Nato official said the expiry of the Nato contingent’s present 90-day mandate was still a matter of debate within the alliance because of different dates of an offer and exchange of letters — the military minds calculating the date at Jan 21 and the legal minds at Feb 2 or 4.

Both Nato officials dismissed fears voiced by some opposition politicians that the relief contingent could lead to a long-term alliance presence in the area and referred to similar relief work it did after floods in Bulgaria and Romania as well to Nato’s departure from Bosnia after helping the Muslims in their conflict with Serbs and plans to do the same in Kosovo.

Answering a question, Mr Walton said that ideally about four weeks was needed to get a force in or get it out adding: “We don’t want to rush out to leave a vacuum”.

He had no idea yet who would take over from his contingent, which is working in Bagh district of Azad Kashmir, but he said it could be the Pakistan Army for the engineering work and the Pakistani Red Crescent Society for the medical work.

“What we are doing is only a small part of what Pakistan army is doing. They are doing the bulk of work, we are simply adding to their work,” he said.

He praised the cooperation extended to the contingent by Pakistan’s military and said the earthquake-stricken population of Bagh district had “nothing but to express thanks and gratitude to us for the work we are doing.”

Asked if his team would take along or leave its engineering and medical equipment in Pakistan at the end of its mission, he said this would depend on decisions by member countries who had contributed the equipment.