Karzai wants more equipment, trainers from NATO

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai on Tuesday described his NATO backers as "naughty friends" and warned that if they do not provide more equipment and beefed up training for Afghan security forces he will seek it from others.

Karzai said his army and police needed more help if they are to take control of all national security by 2014 -- a goal officially endorsed by NATO at a summit in Lisbon last week.

He also acknowledged however that the alliance would have a major role in his country long beyond the official handover.

Senior U.S. and NATO officials have recently warned the date should be considered more a target than a deadline, with mounting violence and training delays both serious potential setbacks.

"We are not happy with the equipment given to the Afghan army up until now, we consider it totally insufficient," Karzai told a news conference on his return from Lisbon.

"Our expectation is for a fully-equipped army corps, and if our NATO allies do not provide us with all the (necessary) equipment, Afghanistan has the freedom to equip its forces from where it can," he said.

Karzai recently revealed that his office gets bags stuffed with hundreds of thousands of dollars of cash from Iran on a regular basis, angering the United States which accuses Tehran of destabilizing Afghanistan. He also said on Tuesday he hoped to improve ties with Russia and other major regional players.

He also criticized the United States for its attitude to Afghanistan, acknowledging the sacrifice of lives and money but saying it was taking the wrong approach to the war.

He compared the two nations to friends on a journey, one following a straight track and one more easily distracted.

"The other friend is a bit naughty, and doesn't pay much attention, so the good friend is obliged to say: 'My brother, the journey is very long, if we go on in this way, we won't arrive'," Karzai said in response to a question about conflicts of opinion with international partners, particularly the United States

Shortly before Lisbon, Karzai had already said he wanted the U.S. military to scale back the visibility and intensity of its operations in Afghanistan, including controversial "night raids."

"The Afghan national army has to take responsibility for protection of this country, we also have to defend our country, it is not good for us to continue to rely on other countries to defend our country," he said on Tuesday.

NATO WILL REMAIN TO COMBAT "TERRORISTS"

Violence in Afghanistan is at its worst since the Taliban were overthrown by U.S.-backed Afghan forces in late 2001, with record casualties on all sides of the conflict despite the presence of about 150,000 foreign troops, and the insurgency spreading to the previously quite peaceful north and west.

Though many Afghans would like to see their country emptied of foreign forces, there are also concerns among those who oppose the Taliban that the departure of Western troops would pave the way for a return of the hardline Islamists.

Karzai said the alliance would remain as a bulwark against the insurgent movement even if it is not in the front line.

"Their commitment to Afghanistan will remain ... which is not let terrorists return in the country and preventing interference in this country," he said. "Presence means enhancing Afghanistan, presence means providing assistance and equipment."

U.S. President Barack Obama, who is due to review his Afghanistan war strategy next month, has already committed to a gradual drawdown of U.S. troops from July 2011. But NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said in Lisbon that no security vacuum would be left behind.

The Taliban dismissed all talk of a timetable for the departure of foreign troops -- which they say should happen immediately -- as "irrational."

(Writing by Emma Graham-Harrison; Editing by Paul Tait and Sanjeev Miglani)