UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - France and Britain introduced a U.N. Security Council resolution on Wednesday that would endorse a landmark accord reached among Afghan factions but hold off on a peacekeeping force until the United States agrees to one.
The 15-member council expects to vote on Thursday, its current president, Moctar Ouane of Mali, said after closed consultations. ``The Security Council declares its readiness to support the implementation of the agreement,'' he said.
The resolution, obtained by Reuters, endorses the ''agreement on provisional arrangements in Afghanistan, pending the establishment of permanent government institutions.''
But a second resolution actually authorizing a multinational force, which would be mandated but not organized by the United Nations, would have to wait until council members persuade the United States military to accept one.
U.N. officials, however, want the force to be deployed before the end of December. Western diplomats and U.S. officials are working on a troop plan, with one option to liaise the force with Afghanistan's Northern Alliance.
``How the council will respond is still a matter of concern,'' U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard said. ``We are all working against a deadline of Dec. 22 when we hope the security arrangements will not only be agreed on but will be deployed.''
Afghan factions, meeting for nine days under U.N. auspices in Bonn, Germany, signed an agreement creating an interim administration in which the militarily dominant Northern Alliance shares power with exile groups. It takes power in the shattered Afghan capital of Kabul on Dec. 22.
The accord requests a peacekeeping force mandated by the U.N. Security Council. The troops are intended to help maintain order in and around Kabul and then could be expanded to other urban centers and other areas.
Countries joining the force in a ``coalition of the willing'' are expected to include Britain, France, Germany, Turkey and possibly Jordan as well as other European nations -- a quasi-NATO contingent without the label. But it is uncertain whether Germany or Britain will lead the force.
A NEW AFGHAN PRESIDENT
The rival Afghan delegations meeting in Bonn, agreed to appoint Hamid Karzai, 46, the ethnic Pashtun chief leading a struggle to chase the Taliban from their last stronghold in the southern city of Kandahar, to lead the interim government.
The hard-fought political success narrowly escaped military disaster as Karzai was slightly injured when an errant bomb from a U.S. B-52 jet killed three U.S. troops and five afghan anti-Taliban fighters north of Kandahar.