HERAT: Nato's top commander, US General James Jones, is used to stiff challenges. Gazing out on the sun-baked mountains of western Afghanistan, he is keenly aware of the importance of this one.

The alliance, which took on its first mission outside Europe last year, agreed at its Istanbul summit to expand peacekeeping forces in the north of the war-scarred country and to boost protection for hoped-for September elections. It also agreed to train troops in Iraq.

Less well-noticed was a green light to start moving into more remote corners of western Afghanistan - stage two of a four-phase plan which could eventually see Nato troops throughout the country.

"The logistical challenges are there. They're not insurmountable, but it's going to take some donations of some fairly impressive capability," Jones said during a recent visit to this dusty town near the Iranian border.

Jones, who earned his four stars after serving in the Balkans in the 1990s, is relentlessly upbeat about hopes for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) which Nato took charge of in August 2003.

While declining to forecast how long Nato could be in Afghanistan, he says progress here has been about twice as rapid as in Bosnia-Hercegovina, from where Nato is just about to withdraw after about a decade.

The ancient city of Herat will soon be the beachhead for Nato in its nascent role as global peacekeeper. "It's the wild, wild West," said Lieutenant Commander James Hand, head of a US-run Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) in the city, world-renowned for its 800-year-old blue-tiled mosque.

While Taliban and drug money remain a problem in surrounding provinces, Herat itself is relatively safe - in gun-bristling Afghanistan such a label is always relative - while culturally conservative and economically resurgent.

On arrival from Kabul the visitor is struck both by an even greater proportion of women dressed in the all-enveloping burqa and by a hugely visible amount of construction and job-generating light industry.

The problem is that one reason for the relative wealth is the continued growing of poppies in surrounding provinces, where Taliban - who oversaw the country's role as the world's biggest drug blackspot - also remain a worry.

In the short term Nato is gearing up to take on four more PRTs in the north of the country, while preparing to boost forces temporarily for ballots still pencilled in for September, despite growing violence and signs authorities may have to delay the polls - originally due in June - for a second time.

In the longer term, the westwards expansion will be keenly watched to see if the West's former Cold War military bloc is up to the job of global peacekeeping. -AFP