The Hague: The United States offered Taliban fighters who renounce violence in Afghanistan an "honourable form of reconciliation" on Monday as part of a revamped strategy to tackle a deepening insurgency.
Iran, attending an international conference on Afghanistan, pledged help in tackling the huge opium trade in its neighbour but stressed it remained opposed to US and other foreign troops there.
The conference in the Netherlands is a chance for member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) and other US allies to consult on the Afghan strategy unveiled by President Barack Obama last week stressing the need to co-operate with regional players such as Iran, Pakistan, Russia and India.
"We must...support efforts by the government of Afghanistan to separate the extremists of Al Qaida and the Taliban from those who have joined their ranks not out of conviction, but out of desperation," US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told the conference in The Hague.
"They should be offered an honourable form of reconciliation and reintegration into a peaceful society, if they are willing to abandon violence, break with Al Qaida, and support the constitution," Clinton said.
Afghan President Hamid Karzai welcomed Obama's "fresh, strong and judicious leadership", but said his government should take the lead in approaches to the Taliban.
"The policy of reconciliation...can succeed only if carried out under the aegis of the national institutions of Afghanistan," he warned. Iran, which sent Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad Mehdi Akhoundzadeh to the talks, promised it would help fight drugs trafficking and in reconstruction projects.
"The presence of foreign forces has not improved things in the country and it seems that an increase in the number of foreign forces will prove ineffective too," Akhoundzadeh said.
But he added: "Iran is fully prepared to participate in the projects aimed at combating drug trafficking and the plans in line with developing and reconstructing Afghanistan."
Clinton and Akhoundzadeh were not due to hold substantive talks in the Hague, but not expected to avoid contact either.
Their joint presence was an easing the policy of the former Bush administration which stuck to a years-long standoff over Tehran's nuclear programme. The West suspects Iran wants a cover for the atom bomb, an aspiration it denies.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov signalled a greater readiness by Moscow to help reconstruct Afghanistan.
"We need to combine the antiterrorist measures with the socio-economic measures to rebuild Afghanistan and in future Russia is quite ready to participate in that effort," he said.
More than 70,000 US and Nato troops are still battling a growing insurgency, which is also spreading its influence in Pakistan.
