US looking for allies

The United States was to call on its European Nato allies today to commit more forces to alliance missions in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Defence ministers from the 26-nation bloc may be ready at talks in the French Riviera city of Nice to announce a long-awaited expansion of peacekeeping in western Afghanistan after recent offers of troops from Spain, Italy and Lithuania.

So far France, Germany and other opponents of the war have refused to set foot in Iraq.