NATO Promises 'Very Robust' Approach In Afghanistan

NATO's secretary-general, Jaap De Hoop Scheffer (file photo) (AFP) June 15, 2006 -- With violence on the rise in southern Afghanistan, NATO Secretary-General Jaap De Hoop Scheffer says Taliban insurgents, drug lords, and warlords will be dealt with "very robustly."

De Hoop Scheffer was speaking after talks with the Canadian prime minister, Stephen Harper, in Ottawa.

U.S. troops are due to hand control of Afghanistan's southwestern provinces to the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force in the coming weeks.

Violence in southern Afghanistan today cost the lives of seven Afghan employees of the airfield in the southern city of Kandahar.

(Reuters, AP)