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The World From Berlin

'Afghanistan Is in a Downward Spiral'

The killing of two German soldiers in a suicide attack in Afghanistan on Monday is fresh evidence that security is deteriorating in the country, write German media commentators. But the deployment remains necessary, they argue.

A suicide bomber with explosives packed into the saddlebags of his bicycle killed two German soldiers and five children in northern Afghanistan on Monday when he blew himself up next to an armored vehicle.

Taliban militants said they had carried out the attack, which brought the German army's death toll to 30 since its deployment began in 2002. Attacks on the German forces stationed in the relatively peaceful north of the country have been increasing in recent months.

Almost 3,500 German troops are serving as part of the NATO's International Security Assistance Force mission, most in Afghanistan's relatively calm north.

Germany is the third-biggest contributor after the US and Britain but has been criticized for not deploying its troops to join combat operations in Afghanistan's more dangerous southern regions.

A majority of Germans oppose the Afghan mission but the country's parliament last week approved an extension of the military mission in Afghanistan for 14 more months, and allowed the immediate deployment of an additional 1,000 troops.

German media commentators say the deaths show the situation in Afghanistan is deteriorating but should not cast doubt on the purpose of the mission which is to help stabilize Afghanistan -- a task that also serves German security interests.

Conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung writes:

"The new attack on the Bundeswehr is sad evidence that security and the general situation in Afghanistan is in a downward spiral. There is no panacea for reversing this trend. And although it is appropriate to pause for a moment when two German soldiers are killed while fulfilling their peaceful mission, one has to remember that their mission in this faraway country serves German security interests, too. Maybe there needs to be a far more sober assessment of what the mission in Afghanistan can and should achieve. But creating stable conditions there remains a task in which the Afghans still need foreign assistance."

Conservative Die Welt points out that a pamphlet titled "Martyrdom Operations in Islam" being circulated among radical Islamists argues that the Koran's strict stance opposing suicide and murders as sins doesn't apply to "martyrs," or suicide attackers.

"Islamic clerics all over the world must counter such interpretations of Islam," Die Welt writes. "That wouldn't stop the terrorist madness in the name of Allah. But it would show that the radicals are in the minority."

Left-wing Frankfurter Rundschau writes:

"The cowardly attack shows that the attackers don't even spare innocent civilians. The German military mission in the Hindu Kush is becoming even more dangerous. But politicians in this country must refrain from concluding that this new attack calls the entire mission into question. The Bundeswehr is now in the eighth year of its mission in Afghanistan. It's a dangerous mission, but an important one too -- as long as it doesn't lose sight of its goal: to put Afghanistan and the authorities there in a position to take over control at some stage. It will take time and will unfortunately cost lives. "

David Crossland, 2.30 p.m. CET