WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama will host Nato Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen in the Oval Office on May 9, the White House said late Monday.

“The two leaders will discuss final preparations for the Nato Summit the President will host in Chicago on May 20-21,” the White House said in a two-sentence statement.

The United States will push to modernize the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, deepen partnerships and hammer out details of the Afghanistan withdrawal at the summit, White House officials said earlier.

The United States also hopes to use the summit, set to be held in Obama’s hometown of Chicago, to highlight and deepen Nato’s global partnerships.

There are some 130,000 foreign soldiers, most from Nato nations, fighting alongside some 350,000 Afghan security personnel in a bid to help Afghan President Hamid Karzai’s government reverse the Taliban-led insurgency.

On Monday Karzai summoned the Nato commander and the US ambassador to warn that civilian casualties in military operations threatened a strategic pact he has signed with the United States.

The pact covers relations between the two countries when US-led Nato forces helping Karzai’s government fight a Taliban insurgency pull out in 2014.