France warns against widening NATO role

PARIS, May 30 (Reuters) France warned NATO today against overextending itself with new responsibilities, urging the bloc to concentrate on its primary security tasks and its existing peacekeeping missions in Afghanistan and Kosovo.

Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie said NATO faced a growing range of new threats but there was a ''temptation among some to want to go beyond our capacities by entrusting to the alliance missions for which it is not equipped.'' The comments at NATO's parliamentary assembly in Paris reflected French scepticism over calls for NATO to take a greater role in dealing with problems outside its home area, as it did in last winter's earthquake crisis in Pakistan.

They also underlined the differences with the broader ambitions of the United States, the bloc's most powerful member, which wants the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation to grow out of its original role as a Europe-based defensive alliance.

''We have to ensure that we don't become an organisation charged with spreading democracy across the world, in the face of the greater Middle East, China or Russia,'' Alliot-Marie said.

''That would be counterproductive, it would risk spreading a conflict of civilisations that we want to avoid,'' she said.

''We must not lose our raison d'etre as a military alliance which allows us to protect our citizens,'' she said.

U.S. GOALS Her comments contrasted with remarks by U.S. general James Jones, NATO's top military commander in Europe, who told the meeting that ''NATO's best contributions and most important contributions lie in the future.'' ''It is an alliance that aspires to become more proactive as opposed to simply being reactive,'' he said.

''It is an alliance that can prevent future conflicts and improve the rise of democracy for countries that are seeking to achieve greater degrees of freedom.'' Ahead of a summit of NATO leaders in Riga in November, the debate underlines the uncertainty over the future direction of NATO in the face of a new generation of security threats ranging from terrorism to the drugs trade.

''Frankness compels me to say that considerable vagueness appears to reign over the concepts and even the raison d'etre of our organisation,'' said Pierre Lellouche, the French president of the NATO parliamentary Assembly.

Secretary general Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said NATO would remain open to admitting new members such as Georgia and the Balkan countries of Albania, Croatia and Macedonia, which all hope to join in coming years.

It would also step up dialogue with outside countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Japan and South Korea and boost ties with institutions like the United Nations or the EU.

But he also pointed to the practical difficulties of running existing operations, urging the parliamentarians to ''fight to ensure your defence budgets are adequately funded and that the resources are allocated sensibly.'' Jones spoke more bluntly: ''The political appetite for the alliance to take on more missions is expanding but the political will to resource these missions is declining,'' he said.

REUTERS CH RK2239