BERLIN, May 5: Germany is to send six soldiers to Afghanistan’s volatile south, but for non-combat operations, a spokesman for the German defence ministry said on Saturday. Germany has come under pressure from its Nato allies to transfer some of its 3,000 troops from the relatively safe north to the south to support their mostly US, British and Canadian allies in fighting Taliban-led insurgents.

But the troops’ very presence in Afghanistan has caused unease in Germany six decades after the end of World War II and a parliamentary mandate limits their activities to areas such as logistics and first aid.

Three of the soldiers now being sent will win over local support for the deployment of Nato’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF). The others will assess conditions in the south for a possible deployment of an Afghan batallion.—AFP