Dutch mull commandoes, attack helicopters for Mali

The Hague (AFP) - The Netherlands is considering sending some 400 soldiers including elite commandos, as well as Apache attack helicopters to war-torn Mali following an appeal for more UN peacekeepers, a newspaper report said Saturday.

The plan follows an urgent request by the UN's special representative in the west African country for more blue helmets as its peacekeeping force faced a new surge of Islamist attacks.

"The plan is to send in around 400 Dutch troops. This included 70 commandos, able to operate behind enemy lines to gather intelligence," the Dutch leftist daily De Volkskrant reported, based on interviews with 15 unnamed diplomats, top military sources and politicians.

"Furthermore, the Netherlands will offer four Apache attack helicopters with pilots and 100 support staff," the paper said.

It also pondered sending 70 intelligence officers, a small force of training staff and soldiers to protect the task force.

The Dutch cabinet is said to make a decision on the issue within the next two weeks, the Volkskrant reported.

The UN special representative to Mali, former Dutch politician Bert Koenders, told the Security Council on Wednesday that Mali's international force needed helicopters and troops as it built up to replace a French force that intervened this year to halt an Islamist takeover.

Koenders said recent attacks in the north of the country had been an important "wake-up call" over security.

He added in a report that "troop generation will have to accelerate" for the UN's Multidimensional Integrated Stabilisation Mission in Mali (MINUSMA).

MINUSMA is meant to eventually reach 12,640 troops and police. At the end of July it had just over 6,000 but Nigerian and some Chadian troops have since withdrawn.

French troops entered Mali in January to halt an advance on the capital Bamako by Al-Qaeda linked Islamist troops and alleged Tuareg rebels.

A presidential election was held in July but militant attacks have resumed in northern Mali where extremist groups are based.

France still has 3,200 troops in Mali but wants to reduce the figure to 1,000 by the end of this year.

The Netherlands twice attempted to join a European Union-flagged military training mission to Mali, but both times the plans were dropped due to infighting within the ruling coalition, the paper said.