A NATO request to keep Dutch troops in Afghanistan after 2010 has led to increasing irritation within the governing three-party coalition. Labour leader and Finance Minister Wouter Bos wants to turn down the request, but Christian Democrat Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen is insisting on a positive response.

Mr Verhagen told reporters that the NATO request was not unexpected. The cabinet spoke about it in advance and Mr Bos could have known that the Atlantic alliance would ask the Dutch to extend its military presence in Afghanistan, the foreign minister said. Mr Bos maintains that he was not aware of the impending request.

Mr Bos' Labour party opposed the Netherlands' participation in the ISAF mission from the outset, but shelved its objections in 2003 in order to be accepted into a coalition with the Christian Democrats and the Christian Union. Labour's parliamentary leader Mariette Hamer has said her party will not accept a Dutch military mission in Afghanistan beyond 2010.

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