From Reuters: Poland urged its NATO allies on Thursday to draft a new strategy for leaving Afghanistan and said it would bring its own troops home by 2012 regardless of what other countries decided.

Acting President Bronislaw Komorowski, who is the frontrunner in a presidential election due on July 4, said Warsaw would try to persuade its NATO allies this autumn to adopt a new approach to the mission. …

"In general, we should aim to set a clear and prompt date for ending this mission and making the Afghan army responsible," Komorowski told a news conference after a meeting of the National Security Council devoted to Afghanistan.

"However, given that we may not succeed in this mission, I have also asked the government to work out a national strategy for pulling out. 2012 is the deadline when it comes to Poland’s presence in Afghanistan. …"

A senior Polish security official said on Thursday that NATO was heading towards a "strategic catastrophe" in Afghanistan.

"There is no perspective for putting an end to this (deteriorating) process," Stanislaw Koziej, the head of Poland’s National Security Bureau (BBN), said in a statement.

"NATO is strategically exhausted by Afghanistan … Poland is also in a strategic deadlock … We must seek a way out of this situation," he said.  (photo: AP)

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