YONHAP NEWS

Seoul set to finalize Afghan troop deployment schedule: officials

By Tony Chang
SEOUL, Nov. 27 (Yonhap) -- Seoul is in the final stages of fixing a timetable for deploying its troops to Afghanistan for protection of its civilian aid workers in the war-torn country, officials said Friday.

   South Korea has long pushed to send security troops to protect a group of civilians working in the Central Asian country where the U.S. is fighting an insurgency.

   According to the officials in Seoul, the government is set to increase the number of civilian workers belonging to the provincial reconstruction team (PRT) to 120, while planning to send about 350 security troops on bodyguard duty.

   The final sizes of PRT workers and security troops will be soon finalized through further consultations among government ministries, said the officials.

   After a weeklong fact-finding mission in Afghanistan, Seoul officials said that the government is considering setting up a camp for soldiers and the PRT in a northern Afghan province.

   "The Defense Ministry plans to submit a motion for the deployment to the National Assembly's regular session next month and later send an on-spot survey team to visit and review candidate destinations," a government source privy to the matter said.

   "A final decision will be made after consulting with the NATO command," the official said.

   Next week's Cabinet meeting is expected to endorse the motion of deployment, which would later be finally signed by President Lee Myung-bak, according to other officials asking to be unnamed.

   Meanwhile, Dennis Blair, director of the U.S. National Intelligence, visited South Korea earlier this week to discuss Seoul's Afghan troop deployment plans, according to government sources, declining to be named.

   The official said that Blair explained recent moves by Washington to increase troop levels in the country, and listened to the South Korea's envisioned deployment timetable.

   odissy@yna.co.kr
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