KABUL, Dec 7: US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel on Saturday said he had received assurances during a visit to Kabul that a long-delayed deal allowing US troops to stay in Afghanistan after 2014 would be signed “in a timely manner”.

The Bilateral Security Agreement (BSA) has been at the centre of a public dispute between the allies, with the US increasingly frustrated by President Hamid Karzai’s negotiating tactics over the deal.

After meetings in the Afghan capital, Mr Hagel told reporters that Defence Minister Bismillah Khan Mohammadi “assured me the BSA would be signed in a timely manner”.

Washington and Nato have repeatedly appealed to Mr Karzai to sign the BSA, which lays out the rules for US-led troops to operate in Afghanistan after 2014 on a mission focused on training and countering Al Qaeda-linked extremists.

The Afghan president, who will stand down next year after two terms in office, recently refused to sign the pact promptly despite a ‘loya jirga’ he had convened voting for him to do so.

President Barack Obama’s deputies have warned that unless Mr Karzai relents before the end of the year, there will be no option but to prepare for a full US exit — the so-called ‘zero option’.

Mr Hagel arrived in Kabul after a visit to Bahrain, while Mr Karzai is due to visit Tehran on Sunday.—AFP