Norway offers to manage Kabul airport for 6 mths

OSLO, Nov 28 (Reuters) NATO member Norway has offered to take charge of operating the international airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, for up to six months next year, Norwegian officials said today.

''This is an important task,'' Norway's Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said on Norwegian broadcaster NRK's radio news from the Latvian capital Riga ahead of the November 28-29 NATO summit.

Norway has come under pressure from the United States and NATO officials to boost its presence in Afghanistan where it currently has 540 soldiers with the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

But in October Norway's centre-left government rejected NATO calls for special forces for service in southern Afghanistan.

''Norway is ready, if asked, to take responsibility for the Kabul international airport from around end of March or early April next year for four to six months, depending on what we are asked to do,'' Colonel Gjermund Eide told Reuters from Riga.

The job of administering the airport will require about 35 personnel, said Eide, a spokesman for Norway's defence minister.

Norway also offered to put its Telemark battalion of about 400 soldiers at the disposal of the NATO Response Force (NRF) for the first half of 2007, Eide said.

The NRF is a quick reaction force that the alliance can deploy wherever needed around the globe for tasks from providing assistance in natural disasters to counterterrorism.

The Telemark battalion would remain based in Norway and be on stand-by for use if NATO decided it was needed, Eide said.

But Norway has not reversed its decision to refrain from sending special forces for southern Afghanistan despite new appeals to the allies on Tuesday from US President George Bush and NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer.

REUTERS SBA BST0210