Rasmussen calls for NATO partnership with China, India

NATO must launch a security partnership with rising powers such as China, India and Pakistan if it wants to be able to guarantee its members' safety, the alliance's head told the Munich Security Conference on Sunday, dpa reported.

   The threats to Europe and North America come from so many parts of the world that NATO will only be able to deal with them properly if it can create a "stronger, more inclusive security coalition with NATO as the hub," Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said.

   "What would be the harm if China, India, Pakistan and other countries were to develop closer ties with NATO? There would only be a benefit in terms of trust, confidence and cooperation," Rasmussen said.

   The idea would be to set up a permanent system in which the world's major players could discuss security problems and strategies. The initiative could even lead to joint training or planning.

 "With a few exceptions, the various parts of the international community who do peace operations still don't train together, we don't really plan together, we aren't joined up in the field ... Ending this fragmentation will require a real cultural revolution," Rasmussen said.

He also said that there was "scope for further Russian engagement" in NATO's mission in Afghanistan, suggesting that Russia could, for example, provide the Afghan defence forces with helicopters and the training and spare parts to operate them.

At the same time, he said that the alliance would have to change its defence systems to deal with new "asymmetric" threats such as terrorism, piracy and cyber-warfare.

"The approaches of a bygone era no longer work: static heavy-metal armies are not going to impress terrorists, pirates and hackers," he said.

NATO is currently debating a new "strategic concept", to be approved at a summit in Portugal in November. That concept is expected to call for more investment in new defence systems and concepts, moving away from the focus on land warfare in Europe.

However, that debate has provoked concern in former-Soviet vassals in Central and Eastern Europe, for whom the main point of NATO membership is to have protection against possible Russian attack.

Those concerns came into sharp focus after Russia's August 2008 war with Georgia - a close diplomatic ally of NATO members such as the Baltic States.

Rasmussen tried to assuage those fears on Sunday, stressing that "NATO's core task is to defend its member states ... We have the right plans, capabilities and solidarity to defend our members."