Berlin - Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet approved Tuesday a 14-month extension of German troop deployment in Afghanistan. Germany currently has 3,500 soldiers serving with the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), but the number is expected to increase to 4,500 under a bill due to go before parliament later in the day.
A vote is not due until mid-October, but the measure is expected easily to pass in the legislature, where Merkel's broad-based coalition enjoys a secure majority.
The bulk of the German troops are serving in the relative calm north of the Country.
ISAF has been in Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban in 2001. Currently there are 53,000 soldiers from 40 nations deployed in Afghanistan, 23,500 of them from the United States.
