BRUSSELS, Feb 9 (Reuters) - NATO appointed Britain&${esc.hash}39;s current ambassador to Iran as its new civilian representative in Kabul on Wednesday.
Simon Gass will replace Mark Sedwill, another Briton, who has served in the post for a year. He will formally take up the position at an April 14-15 meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Berlin, the military alliance said in a statement.
The announcement that Gass is to leave Tehran could help defuse a diplomatic row with London. The Iranian parliament is due to vote in the coming days on a motion to break all diplomatic ties with Britain in protest at comments he made on the embassy&${esc.hash}39;s website about human rights in Iran.[ID:nLDE6BI0C3]
Gass said he would be coming into the Afghan role in "a period of transition in Afghanistan which will be critical for the country&${esc.hash}39;s stability and security".
Sedwill, who previously served as Britain&${esc.hash}39;s ambassador in Kabul, has pushed plans for a gradual handover of security responsibility from the NATO-led international force in Afghanistan to Afghan security forces.
The district-by-district, province-by-province transition envisages Afghan forces having full security responsibility countrywide by 2014, and should allow for a gradual reduction in the 150,000 foreign troops in the country.
NATO plans to announce details of the transition plan in March, with a view to launching the actual process later in the first half of this year.
NATO officials said Sedwill was leaving as scheduled as he had reached the end of his mandate.
Despite 10 years of war, foreign troops have struggled to contain a Taliban-led insurgency, which has spread countrywide and brought the worst levels of violence since U.S.-led forces drove the Islamists from power after the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001. (reporting by David Brunnstrom, additional reporting by Robin Pomeroy in Tehran, editing by Philippa Fletcher)
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