Germany says no troops to Iraq, Afghan hot-spots

BERLIN, Nov 13 (Reuters) Germany today ruled out sending combat troops to Iraq and fended off pressure to shift peacekeepers to unstable parts of southern Afghanistan, but said it could expand training of Iraqi police and military personnel.

Last week US Democrats wrested control of Congress from President George W. Bush's Republican Party, partly because of dissatisfaction with his handling of the Iraq war.

Following the result, German President Horst Koehler urged Germany and Europe to do more to help rectify the situation in Iraq, which he said had become a disaster.

Asked at a government news conference if he could rule out Germany sending troops to Iraq, German Defence Ministry spokesman Thomas Raabe told reporters: ''Yes.'' Earlier, in a newspaper interview, government spokesman Thomas Steg had indicated that Germany would be willing to expand its training programme for Iraqi security officials.

''We are also ready to do more,'' Steg told the Berliner Zeitung.

''We could also imagine doing this by expanding the training of border guards.'' Germany has forgiven some Iraqi debt and helped train military and police officials in the United Arab Emirates, but it has consistently refused to deploy combat troops in Iraq.

The 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq and the resulting occupation have been extremely unpopular in Germany. Former Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's opposition to the Iraq invasion helped him win re-election in 2002.

PRESSURE FROM WASHINGTON German officials have said the Democratic victory could result in increased pressure from Washington for more German help in hot spots like Iraq and Afghanistan.

Germany currently has around 9,000 troops deployed around the world on peacekeeping missions, including in Afghanistan, the West Asia and Congo.

Roughly 2,800 German soldiers are stationed in the relatively calm northern part of Afghanistan, though the United States and Britain have put pressure on Berlin to send combat troops to the more dangerous southern part of the country.

Adding to the pressure on Germany, NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer wrote in an opinion article in the Berliner Zeitung that individual NATO members should scrap the restrictions they have imposed on Afghan peacekeeping work.

''We need to better configure our forces in Afghanistan,'' Scheffer wrote. ''That also means removing the limitations individual nations have placed on their troops.'' Berlin has rebuffed requests that it redeploy troops to the south.

''Germany has a strong presence in Afghanistan. We have taken responsibility for the North,'' Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Monday after a meeting with New Zealand's prime minister.

''We have a mandate that allows us in emergencies to help in the south but we believe this mandate should not be altered,'' she added.

REUTERS PDM RAI2036